In the first half of 2020, the COVID-19 epidemic spread globally, international oil prices plummeted, the global economy suffered a huge impact, and market demand was weak. The performance of “Two Barrels of Oil” in the first half of the year was dismal. According to recent announcements by Sinopec and PetroChina According to semi-annual report data, the two companies’ combined losses in the first half of the year reached 52.865 billion yuan.
Crude oil, as the source of bulk commodities, its own losses are also negative for various chemical products. Although the market conditions of various industrial chains are not good, there is no shortage of bright spots to be found, that is, the price of ethylene glycol has been “above” PTA recently.
From the perspective of futures
August 31,The main 2101 contract of ethylene glycol futures on the Dalian Commodity Exchange closed at 4,040 yuan/ton, an increase of 101 yuan/ton, or 2.56%, compared with the settlement price on the previous trading day.
The main 2101 contract of Zhengzhou Commercial Exchange PTA futures closed at 3748 yuan/ton, compared with the settlement price on the previous trading day, It increased by 26 yuan/ton, or 0.70%.
September 1,The main 2101 contract of DCE ethylene glycol futures closed at 4,079 yuan/ton, an increase of 78 yuan/ton, or 1.95%, compared with the settlement price on the previous trading day.
The main 2101 contract of Zhengzhou Commercial Exchange PTA futures is 3752 yuan/ton, compared with the settlement price of the previous trading day , an increase of 20 yuan/ton, or 0.54%.
From a price point of view
Most of this year At that time, the price of PTA was not as good as that of ethylene glycol, or even surpassed by a lot. Only in June, the price of PTA recovered somewhat, but it was soon overtaken by ethylene glycol. PTA has always been the “big player” in the polyester raw material market, once devouring the profits of the entire industry chain. Compared with PTA, ethylene glycol is a smaller chemical product, so the price of PTA is higher than that of ethylene glycol. Very common thing.
However, the recent momentum of ethylene glycol has been “stronger” than PTA. As can be seen from the figure below, PTA prices continue to decline, while ethylene glycol has room to rise. As of now, the internal price of ethylene glycol is around 3,875 yuan/ton, and the internal price of PTA is around 3,510 yuan/ton.
In recent times, crude oil prices have been at 43 The U.S. dollar is hovering in a stable range. In terms of downstream demand, polyester factories are in a state of high inventory, high operating capacity, and low demand. The weaving market is also in a state of high inventory, and the order situation does not lead to large-scale destocking.
Then, in the absence of substantial benefits for the cost end and downstream polyester demand, the ethylene glycol market can continue to suppress PTA, and the biggest assistant behind it is Low inventory!
Although affected by the epidemic, the production and sales of PTA and ethylene glycol are difficult to balance, and the factory is basically in a state of overstocking. However, starting from August, the market conditions have loosened, some products can be shipped, and manufacturers can destock their warehouses in stages, resulting in an improvement in polyester production and sales compared with the first half of the year. Transmitted to the level of polyester raw materials, ethylene glycol inventory has declined. As of now, the inventory of ethylene glycol at the main port in East China is around 1.38 million tons.
At the same time, as the hurricane in the United States and the shutdown of Saudi Arabian equipment have intensified overseas shrinkage expectations, in the short term, with the reduction of import supply and the high start-up of downstream polyester, B The supply and demand side of glycol is gradually improving, boosting the market recovery.
On the contrary, starting in June, PTA It continues to enter the class library stage, and it is difficult to remove the library. In July and August, the peak season for PTA maintenance in previous years, this year’s maintenance plans were mostly postponed or canceled, resulting in high PTA inventory. As of now, PTA’s socially tradable inventory is around 2.72 million tons. As can be seen from the figure below, there is still an upward trend in inventory.
In September, the PTA equipment maintenance plan has been reduced or postponed compared with August. For example, the maintenance plan of Yiyi was originally scheduled to start on September 1 for 2 weeks. Sheng Ningbo 4# 2.2 million tons PTA unit continues to be delayed. In addition, there are still many sets of PTA units expected to be put into operation in the second half of the year. The output is increasing but the demand for polyester is insufficient to follow up. In the next short period of time, PTA will still be in a cumulative inventory situation, restraining the room for price increases.
One of the important factors related to PTA and ethylene glycol stocks is their load. According to statistics, so far, the ethylene glycol load is around 57%, while the PTA load is as high as around 79%. The important reason for the low load of ethylene glycol is that ethylene glycol is a liquid and difficult to store, so the manufacturer will control the output. An important factor in the increase in PTA load is that the PTA manufacturer’s production plan is still being implemented, and the PTA production line itself has a large output. It is difficult to find an inflection point due to the high inventory of PTA. In addition, its own load and output are higher than that of ethylene glycol, so the price growth rate is naturally lower than that of ethylene glycol.
In general, whether it is PTA or Ethylene glycol is facing a situation of high inventory and low demand. Although the price of the two is slightly higher than that of ethylene glycol, the specific future market trend does not depend on its own fundamentals, but more on the performance of downstream polyester demand. . Now that we have entered the “Golden Nine”, we still need to pay attention to the changes in orders in the weaving market.
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