Due to weakened costs and insufficient demand, the domestic PTA market has maintained a fluctuating downward trend since March. According to the Commodity Market Analysis System of Shengyi Society, as of March 10th, the average price of PTA market in East China was 4850 yuan/ton, a decrease of 2.34% from the beginning of the month and a year-on-year decrease of 16.92%.
Looking at the future market, on the supply side, PTA spot processing fees continued to weaken by the end of 2024, and remained at a low level around 300 yuan/ton at the beginning of this year. The profit gap of the enterprise has led to an increase in maintenance enthusiasm. There were many PTA plant maintenance in March, and as of March 10th, the industry’s operating rate was at a one-year low of 77%. According to statistics, the domestic PTA production capacity for maintenance and planned maintenance in March was 10.15 million tons.
The escalation of trade frictions has led to a larger than expected increase in US crude oil inventories. Investors are concerned that OPEC+will decide to increase production starting in April, causing international crude oil prices to remain weak. As of March 7th, the settlement price of the main contract for US WTI crude oil futures was $67.04 per barrel, and the settlement price of the main contract for Brent crude oil futures was $70.36 per barrel. Attention should be paid to the destocking of US crude oil and the disturbance of the situation in the Middle East.
In terms of demand, downstream polyester plants will restart, resulting in a narrow increase in operating load, which will increase the demand for PTA. At the same time, the new polyester production capacity put into operation in the early stage will realize the output, and the demand for PTA will also increase. Most textile terminal production enterprises have expressed that the issuance of new orders is still slow and lack confidence in the future market. The space for further increase in weaving end elasticity and weaving start-up rate is limited. Currently, the weaving start-up rate in Jiangsu and Zhejiang regions is around 67%, and insufficient orders may lead to a subsequent decline in start-up rate.
Business analysts believe that the current PTA maintenance efforts are significant and coupled with the expectation of a rebound in demand for “gold, silver, and four”, it is expected that PTA destocking in March and April may boost market confidence. But we still need to pay attention to changes in crude oil and demand.
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