Growth in operating rates of copper foil companies slowed amid sluggish export orders

The operating rates of copper foil enterprises stood at 85.33% in August, up 3.11 percentage points month on month but down 0.86 percentage point year on year. The average operating rate of large, medium-scale and small enterprises stood at 87.03%, 83.65% and 81.35%, respectively.

The average operating rate of electronic circuit copper foil stood at 85.35%, up 9.02 percentage points on the month. That at lithium battery copper foil enterprises stood at 85.57%, down 0.36 percentage point. Average operating rate estimated at 87.83% in September. (Notes: SMM surveyed 36 producers with a combined capacity of 1.25 million mt/year.)

The growth in operating rates of copper foil plants in August was mainly driven by the continued rebound in new orders in the electronic circuit copper foil industry. End-user consumption of electronic circuit copper foil continued to pick up slightly, with the sentiment in the printed circuit board market rebounding. And inventories in the upstream and downstream of the industry chain were gradually digested. New orders of the automotive electronics industry and server industry, which have long been supported by policies, were stable.