Home Appliance and New Energy Lead the Gains in Work Resumption, Enamelled Wire Operating Rate in the First Week After the Holiday at 49.93% [SMM Enamelled Wire Market Weekly Review]

         Affected by the Chinese New Year holiday, the operating rate in the enamelled wire industry recorded 49.93% this week (2.20–2.26), and new orders pulled back by 27.75 percentage points compared to pre-holiday levels. Although the industry has fully resumed work, the recovery pace of end-use consumption remained slow, and enterprises generally reported that demand would not return to normal levels until after the Lantern Festival, consistent with previous years' patterns. By downstream segment, production and orders showed significant divergence: end-use demand for home appliances was strong, and related enamelled wire enterprises faced tight supply with "insufficient goods to deliver"; new orders in the NEV and power transformer sectors were also robust, with operating rates at related enterprises rebounding to over 90%. In contrast, new orders in traditional sectors showed mediocre performance, and operating rates at most enterprises remained at 20–30%. Inventory side, due to both holiday stockpiling and slower cargo pick-up pace from downstream, days of inventories for finished products in the industry rose to 15.53 days. As workers gradually return to their posts and equipment operations normalize, coupled with a gradual recovery in downstream demand, SMM expects the operating rate in the enamelled wire industry to rebound to 78.4% next week.