Copper consumption has always been the focus of the industry. To provide a more in-depth and timely reflection of the market situation, the SMM Copper Research Team has been conducting in-depth research on the order volume and production status of enamelled wire enterprises since January 2025, forming weekly operating rate and order intake data.
rom the weekly operating rate data, influenced by the Chinese New Year holiday, the operating rate of the enamelled wire industry reached its lowest level from late January to early February. As the holiday ended, enamelled wire enterprises gradually resumed normal production, and the operating rate steadily rebounded. In March, the operating rate of the enamelled wire industry showed a pattern of initially jumping and then pulling back, with weekly operating rates of 89.5%, 89.2%, 88.1%, and 87.6%, averaging 88.6%, primarily due to the impact of copper prices. According to SMM, March is traditionally the peak season for the industry. From the demand performance of downstream sectors, market orders have generally reached peak season levels. Since late February, multiple enterprises have reported continuous improvement in orders from downstream sectors such as home appliances, automobiles, new energy, and industrial motors, particularly with outstanding performance in home appliance and automotive orders, boosting the rapid growth of enamelled wire orders and ensuring sufficient production schedules for enamelled wire enterprises. However, as copper prices surged past 80,000 yuan/mt, downstream enterprises faced resistance from losses, significantly slowing down the pace of order placement, which affected the operating rate of enamelled wire enterprises.
From the perspective of production costs, due to the high cost of shutting down and restarting machines in the enamelled wire industry, most enterprises would not rashly shut down machines in the event of a short-term decline in orders. Therefore, SMM conducted a survey of the current week's orders from multiple enterprises, allowing us to more intuitively sense the changes in order volume through the weekly order data. From the weekly order volume, new orders began to decline continuously from the second week of March, with weekly order volume showing negative growth MoM, which more directly reflects the suppression of consumption by high copper prices.
Recently, with the pullback in copper prices, new orders in the enamelled wire industry are expected to return to positive growth. How will the orders in the enamelled wire industry perform this week? Will there be growth beyond expectations? SMM will continue to share relevant data on Thursday, which can be queried on the SMM data terminal.
