Question 1.

1. What trend and pattern information does your organization pay attention to?

Our organization is purely reactive to significant external competitive forces within the commodity markets we sell into. Trends we look at are typically short term trends; those that affect the pricing structures of our raw materials. Impacts like political forces in China or decisions by our Department of Commerce drive pricing of raw materials in our markets. We respect to our market segments, we have a high dependency on the housing and construction markets therefore these markets are tracked to help budgeting efforts.