Leading the coquettish, outstanding… these adjectives are completely occupied by PTA in the recent polyester industry chain!
Since entering the maintenance season, the PTA market has been booming, with everything winning!
In fact, since the beginning of this year, with the strong international oil prices and the positive market boost, the PTA market has rebounded and increased. Coupled with the frequent maintenance of PTA equipment in recent months and the boost from the news of the unexpected shutdown of Formosa Plastics’ PX equipment, the PTA market is even stronger.
It can also be seen from the price comparison chart of various products in the polyester industry chain that in the year-on-year period, only the price of PTA is increasing year-on-year, and the increase is 16.58%; while the prices of other upstream and downstream products have fallen to varying degrees year-on-year. Compared with last month’s price, PTA is also the strongest product.
The key points here must be from PTA Profit status! In the entire polyester industry chain, PTA’s profits are definitely “outstanding”. Whether it is upstream PX or downstream polyester filament, the profit margins have been swallowed up.
Judging from the PTA profit trend this year, PTA manufacturers can basically maintain In terms of profitability; since March, the profit margin of the PTA market has increased significantly. Especially in mid-to-late April, due to the PX month change and the imbalance of long and short buying and selling orders, the price of PX fell sharply, which further expanded the profit margin of PTA. Recently, its cash flow has been close to 1,350 yuan/ton, rising to nearly 9 Earnings hit a monthly high.
Whether it is PTA’s own price status or high profitability, the greatest confidence comes from the support and boost from the tight supply and demand pattern.
From the perspective of PTA supply and demand, according to statistics, from the end of March to April, Yisheng Lian 3.75 million tons, Hengli Petrochemical 2.2 million tons, Zhuhai BP 1.25 million tons tons, Jiaxing Petrochemical’s 2.2 million tons and other PTA devices are undergoing maintenance. A rough calculation is that the PTA maintenance loss in April was about 240,000 tons. The PTA output in April is expected to be 3.56 million tons. Polyester production in April is estimated to be 4.29 million tons, and PTA destocking is estimated to be around 250,000 tons in April. By the end of April, PTA social inventory may be around 1 million tons. May is still the intensive maintenance season for PTA equipment. As for polyester, it still maintains high load operation, with the average load around 92%. It is expected that PTA may maintain a destocking status in the short term.
It can be seen from the above data that PTA’s own inventory has always been at a low level in recent times. In addition, PTA companies have a relatively strong voice in the industry. With the favorable cooperation of all parties, Next, PTA naturally sits firmly on the twin thrones of price and profitability.
But can PTA’s strong momentum be sustained? Pressure from all parties will inevitably follow. Will it dampen the PTA’s arrogance?
First of all, crude oil has fallen for two consecutive weeks for the first time this year. As the source product of the polyester industry chain, will it face the PTA market from fundamentals and news? Have a suppressive effect?
Judging from the recent trend of crude oil, speculation about the expected reduction in future supply is the main reason for the rise in oil prices. The surge in U.S. crude oil inventories and Russia’s failure to meet production cut targets have eased concerns about tight supply. As a result, Brent crude oil was expected to fall more than 2% on a weekly basis last week, and U.S. crude oil fell nearly 2.5%, marking the second consecutive week. Weekly decline. Some market participants predict that current oil prices have fully reflected the market’s expectations of reduced crude oil supply, including from Iran, and therefore oil prices lack momentum to rise in the short term.
Secondly, although PTA equipment is currently in a period of intensive maintenance, in the face of high profits, we do not rule out the possibility that some PTA factories may postpone maintenance or shorten maintenance time. At that time, the expected destocking of PTA and the tight supply situation may be broken. .
Of course, no matter what measures are taken upstream or downstream, the ultimate goal is to achieve It is beneficial to the balance between price and profit in the polyester industry chain! It is still necessary to pay close attention to the deviation between the actual future supply of crude oil and the current expectations, as well as the maintenance status of the PTA device.</p
