Nan Ya Raises Copper Clad Laminates Prices by 20% Amid Rising Raw Material Costs and AI Demand

In terms of cable and wire inventories this week, constrained by high copper prices, cable and wire enterprises generally adopted a rigid-demand purchasing strategy, locking in prices for small restocking only during minor copper price pullbacks. As a result, raw material inventories edged down 0.49% month-on-month. To ease inventory pressure, downstream enterprises prioritized drawing down finished goods inventories, which fell 2.33% month-on-month. Looking ahead to next week, the weak demand pattern across all segments is unlikely to reverse, and the industry lacks short-term recovery momentum. Under the dual pressure of high copper prices and off-season demand, SMM expects the copper cable and wire operating rate to fall a further 1.18 percentage points month-on-month to 61.08% next week (August 14–August 20), representing a year-on-year decline of 7.8 percentage points.

This week (August 7–August 13), SMM's copper cable and wire enterprise operating rate came in at 62.25%, down 1.4 percentage points month-on-month and 7.05 percentage points year-on-year. Copper prices remained elevated throughout the week, continuing to suppress downstream purchasing enthusiasm. Combined with overall weak terminal orders and no substantive improvement on the demand side, the industry's production load continued to decline.

The following table shows the ferrous and nonferrous metals movement on the SHFE and DCE on 14 Aug , 2026