One Houston Plant, Thirty-Five Percent of the Butadiene

TPC Group tells its own customers it makes about 35% of all the butadiene in North America. It makes every pound of that at one plant, in Houston, and on August 7 the funds that have owned it since the bankruptcy agreed to sell it to a Japanese energy and materials group.

The Port Neches units that used to run alongside it stopped being production in November 2019, and that site is a terminal now. So the concentration is not a figure of speech.

"When the largest merchant seller of a feedstock changes hands, does the merchant book survive the new owner?"

ENEOS Holdings signed a merger agreement with TPC Holdings on August 7 and expects to close during October, subject to approvals.

What makes the release worth reading is not the announcement. It is page three.

What the Buyer Got to See

Japanese disclosure practice makes an acquirer publish the target's recent results. TPC has been private since it came out of Chapter 11 in December 2022, so its accounts have not been public.

They are now, in a four-page PDF, in Japanese.

Operating income went $93m, then $118m, then $25m. Net income to the parent went $26m, $9m, then a loss of $34m (chart below).

Revenue fell 10.1% in 2025, from $1,681m to $1,511m, and the recurring line, the one that lands after interest, went from +$54m to -$44m.

The timing is the part that should hold your attention. TPC finished its capital program in December 2024, taking Houston butadiene nameplate to 1.1 billion pounds a year and lifting crude C4 processing 25% above any prior year's peak.

The expansion completed, and then the earnings broke.