PETALING JAYA: Lotte Chemical Corp is reactivating its plan to sell its Bursa Malaysia-listed subsidiary Lotte Chemical Titan Holding Bhd (LCTitan) and a stake in its Indonesian unit, according to the Korea Economic Daily.
South Korea’s second largest petrochemical group had halted the sale processes for its Malaysian and Indonesian units following the outbreak of the US-Iran war earlier this year, the daily reported yesterday.
Citing anonymous Korean government officials, the newspaper said Lotte Chemical is reviewing market conditions and searching for potential buyers, with its loss-making Malaysian unit as the primary sales target.
It is also in talks with Indonesia’s sovereign wealth fund Danantara for the partial divestment of its Indonesian subsidiary, the report added.
The planned divestments come amid a challenging time for the global petrochemical industry which is grappling with a capacity glut.
In March 2024, news reports said the company was seeking potential buyers for LCTitan and had engaged with domestic and foreign companies as well as global private equity firms.
The reports, quoting sources, indicated the prospective deal was estimated at US$600 million (RM2.44 billion).
Lotte Chemical owns about 75% of LCTitan, which was established in 1989 and is one of Southeast Asia’s largest integrated producers of olefins and polyolefins. It has 12 plants in Pasir Gudang and Tanjung Langsat, Johor.
In 2010, the Korean group acquired Titan Chemical Corp Bhd (now LCTitan) from Malaysia’s The Chao Group, which held a 70% stake, and Permodalan Nasional Bhd’s (PNB) 30% stake for US$1.25 billion (RM5.07 billion at current exchange rates).
LCTitan was delisted from Bursa Malaysia in 2011 and subsequently relisted in 2017 with a market capitalisation of approximately RM15 billion (based on the IPO price of RM6.50 per share).
Persistent losses over the years have decimated its share price by over 90%, and it is currently trading at just 31 sen, valuing the company at RM716.8 million.
LCTitan sank deeper into the red for the second quarter ended June 30 (Q2 FY2026), weighed down by inventory write-downs and higher costs from its new Indonesian petrochemical plant.
Net loss attributable to shareholders widened by 0.6% to RM174.19 million from RM173.09 million a year earlier, while overall net loss more than doubled to RM401.67 million from RM189.33 million.
However, quarterly revenue surged 116.4% to RM3.11 billion from RM1.44 billion, driven mainly by contributions from the Lotte Chemical Indonesia New Ethylene project, which started operations in October 2025, and higher average selling prices.
