SMM Survey on Consumption across Copper Downstream Industries

Wire and cable: New orders continued to slide last week. According to the SMM survey, the recovery of real estate was still slow, and the orders for civil wires were not performing well. Bid solicitation volumes by the State Grid in April has decreased from March, and the delivery volume was relatively limited, giving limited boost to the demand for cables. A leading company in the survey said that after a surge in orders in March, its new orders already dropped nearly 20%, and it mainly produced for previous orders. The company now is deeply worried about the production and sales from late April to May. In generally, the operating rates of the cable industry will be suppressed.

Enamelled wire: Last week, orders for the enamelled wire industry decreased noticeably, and downstream consumption fell short of expectations. Except for orders related to large transformers and motors that saw stable production, orders in other traditional industries decreased. A medium-sized enterprise even said that its order already fell by 20%, and thus was pessimistic about the traditional peak season. Downstream demand was poor, because some demand was released in advance in mid-March and continuous gains in copper prices pressured downstream consumption.

Copper cathode rod: The average operating rate of key copper rod producers using copper cathode was around 65.06% last week, a drop of 3.79 percentage points from a week earlier. New orders dropped significantly. Due to the decline in the demand from downstream cable and enamelled wire industries, many copper rod companies using copper cathode as raw material reported high finished product inventories, and began to cut output during the week. This lowered the industry's average operating rate last week. Some companies will cut output this week, and the operating rates of the copper cathode rod industry will continue to decline.