High Copper Prices Suppress End-Use Demand, Wire and Cable Enterprises Face Significant Challenges in Resuming Production [SMM Weekly Review of the Wire and Cable Market]

       This week (2.14-2.20), the operating rate of SMM copper wire and cable enterprises was 70.08%, up 12.97 percentage points WoW, with the growth rate slowing compared to last week. It was 12.6 percentage points lower than the same period last year on the lunar calendar and only 1.3 percentage points higher than the expected operating rate. According to SMM, current copper prices remain high, significantly suppressing market demand. Only some channel customers exhibited a "rush to buy amid continuous price rise" behavior, while most customers reported a noticeable slowdown in the growth of new orders this week. By industry, orders for medium- and low-voltage products used in real estate and infrastructure were extremely weak, with very few new orders, as the slow resumption of terminal projects impacted order growth for wire and cable enterprises. Only a few enterprises reported moderate performance in PV and instrumentation and control orders, while orders from the two grids maintained a normal pace without any standout performance. From the perspective of enterprise inventory, due to high copper prices and unsatisfactory growth in new orders, most enterprises reduced inventory to minimize capital occupation. The market is still in the post-holiday resumption phase, but the overall progress is slower than the same period last year on the lunar calendar due to the impact of copper prices. SMM expects the operating rate to increase by 8.31 percentage points to 78.39% next week (2.21-2.27).