The PTA market has been operating stably since August. A few sets of equipment went into maintenance at the beginning of the month as scheduled. However, the market situation fluctuated after a weak downturn, but the overall increase was limited. At present, the market news is relatively light, the fundamentals of supply and demand have not fluctuated significantly, the downstream wait-and-see sentiment is strong, and firm demand trading is dominated.
PTA monthly supply and demand trend:
Source: Longzhong Information
Recent PTA maintenance and production reduction situation:
Source: Longzhong Information
In August, the maintenance of PTA equipment is carried out as scheduled, including the maintenance of Ningbo Taihua’s 1 million tons equipment In two weeks, the Sanfangxiang 1.2 million tons unit has been overhauled for one month. The Tongkun 2.2 million tons unit is currently restarted. Next, Yangzi Petrochemical’s 650,000 tons unit will be overhauled near August 6, and Honggang Petrochemical’s 1.5 million tons unit will be overhauled in mid-August. 4-5 days. Reignwood Petrochemical’s 1.4 million tons fell by 50% in mid-August. Therefore, the PTA supply and demand pattern improved slightly in August. The supply side takes the initiative to reduce the load. If all PTA devices enter maintenance and reduce the load as scheduled, there may be phased destocking starting in mid-to-late August. The short-term improvement in supply and demand will slightly improve the market sentiment.
From a downstream perspective, although polyester cash flow is on the verge of loss, due to the continuous restart of early equipment and the continuous investment of new equipment, production reduction and load reduction have not been achieved. The current domestic The polyester load remains near 87.34%. The terminal market load has improved slightly in recent weeks, and some companies have moderately replenished goods. However, considering that downstream demand is difficult to improve in the short term, the market is expected to have greater resistance to rising prices, and the probability of short-term polyester market consolidation is high. The market outlook will focus on the recovery of terminal foreign trade and autumn and winter orders.
Taking a comprehensive look, there is a slight improvement on the short-term PTA supply and demand side, but from the cost side, crude oil prices fluctuate and adjust, fluctuating up and down. The space is limited. The PX market has recently declined due to production cuts due to downstream demand. The PX processing gap continues to fluctuate within a narrow range, affecting the upward momentum of PTA. Therefore, the short-term PTA market is still in a volatile consolidation situation. </p