Finished Product Inventory of Lead-acid Battery Producers Increased amid CNY Holiday

SHANGHAI, Feb 15 (SMM) - According to an SMM survey of 30 lead-acid battery producers, their average inventory of finished products stood at 22.93 days in January, up 4.28 days from the end of December, but down 3.6 days on the year.

This survey sample involves an annual capacity of 279.99 million KvAh and an annual lead consumption of 6.34 million mt of lead. The survey covers 15 producers of traction batteries, 12 producers of starting batteries and 3 producers of stationary batteries.

According to research, the lead-acid battery market stagnated in January as most producers and traders took holidays for CNY. As usual, logistics services were on holiday earlier than battery companies and traders this year. The logistics services in some regions were halted on December 25 at earliest, and that in most other regions were halted around January 8, while battery companies and traders took holidays on January 10-20. As such, the finished product inventory of lead-acid battery enterprises declined before the holiday amid the restocking activity of traders, but then increased inevitably amid the halted logistics services. The transportation did not resume until January 28 and thus the finished product inventory of producers increased during the Chinese New Year holiday.