The Shandong market is gradually entering the holiday period.

[SMM Monthly Cable Inventory] Days of raw material inventories for copper wire and cable increased slightly by 0.19 days MoM in January, due to early stockpiling for the holiday combined with cautious enterprise procurement under copper price fluctuations, adopting a "lock-in copper based on orders" approach; days of finished product inventories decreased slightly by 0.13 days MoM, as grid tender orders were finalized and enterprises managed production schedules to balance inbound and outbound inventory, promoting a slight destocking of finished products.

[SMM Monthly Cable Operating Rate] The operating rate for copper wire and cable was 70.1% in January, up 1.21 percentage points MoM and 14.85 percentage points YoY. The key drivers included two aspects: first, against the backdrop of intensified copper price fluctuations, new orders increased during the period of copper price correction, while downstream willingness to pick up goods also strengthened; second, backlog orders affected by rising copper prices and year-end funding pressure at the end of December were largely released in January.