Overall, some refineries completed maintenance and resumed production this week, leading to an increase in supply, particularly for medium- and high-sulphur petroleum coke. Coupled with the wait-and-see attitude of downstream enterprises in the petroleum coke market at month-end, market trading activity has weakened, and petroleum coke prices have fallen continuously. Despite the approaching holiday, downstream enterprises have not shown significant stockpiling behavior, still focusing on purchasing as needed. In general, the petroleum coke market currently lacks significant supportive factors on both the supply and demand sides, and prices are expected to remain weak in the short term.

Overall, based on the prebaked anode export data for April 2025, although there was a general decline in export volume, there were different performances in segmented markets. Orders exported to Malaysia, Indonesia, and Bahrain decreased significantly, mainly due to aluminum smelters digesting their existing inventories, leading to a reduction in demand for new orders. However, orders for prebaked anodes exported to Germany showed an increasing trend, closely related to the recovery of the European aluminum industry. With the recovery of the European market, increased demand drove corresponding prebaked anode imports. According to SMM's survey, export orders performed well overall in 2025. One of the main reasons was the continuous addition of new capacity in the overseas aluminum market and the resumption of production by some enterprises, a trend that boosted demand for prebaked anodes. Additionally, domestic prebaked anode prices surged in Q1 2025 due to a sharp increase in raw material prices, leading to a corresponding increase in overseas order prices. However, after entering Q2, signs of weakness emerged in the raw material side of prebaked anodes, weakening the driving force behind price increases. It is expected that export order prices will also shift from rising to falling.

[SMM Analysis of Downstream Aluminum Sector: PMI of Aluminum Processing Industry Declined 1.8% MoM in May - Weak Domestic Demand Across Most Sectors, with Significant Structural Differentiation] The composite PMI of the aluminum processing industry in May was recorded at 49.8%, approaching the 50 mark but still in contraction territory, down 1.8 percentage points MoM and up 8.7% YoY.