In the first half of 2024, with the continuous advancement of capacity control and the seasonal recovery of demand, the industry gradually achieved supply and demand balance and glass fiber product prices rose, and the overall efficiency level of the industry improved. However, due to the continued internal and external factors that plague the development of the industry, some local governments and social capital are still enthusiastic about investing in glass fiber, and the current supply and demand balance in the industry market is fragile! The glass fiber industry must change its development ideas. On the basis of doing a good job in capacity control, the focus is to be guided by the new development concept, continue to carry out scientific and technological innovation, create new momentum and new advantages for development, open up new fields and new tracks for development, and complete the transition from high-speed growth to high-quality development as soon as possible.
1. Overview of the overall operation of the industry in the first half of the year
(I) Capacity and output
1. Glass fiber yarn: the growth rate of production continues to decline
The cumulative growth rate of glass fiber yarn production continued to decline in the first half of the year, and the year-on-year growth rate decreased from 4.8% in the first quarter to 2.3%. Since May, the year-on-year growth rate of glass fiber yarn production in a single month has turned from positive to negative, and the year-on-year growth rate of glass fiber yarn production in a single month in June was -0.7%.
2. Fiberglass products: Deep adjustment of market demand structure
(1) Industrial felt products:
As my country's economy transitions from a high-speed growth stage to a high-quality development stage, the market for fiberglass industrial felt products is undergoing profound changes, which in turn affects the survival and development of a large number of small and medium-sized fiberglass and product companies. On the one hand, the total investment in real estate development in the first half of the year was 5252.9 billion yuan, a year-on-year decrease of 10.1%, of which residential investment was 3988.3 billion yuan, a year-on-year decrease of 10.4%. Affected by the deep adjustment of the real estate market, the market segment of building fiberglass products, including fiberglass mesh products for building insulation, continued to remain sluggish, and the production and operation of related companies continued to be under pressure. However, at the same time, investment in infrastructure construction, including water conservancy, railways, and electricity, continued to grow, and new demands and applications continued to emerge in the energy, environmental protection, and consumer electronics market segments. Various types of energy-saving, insulation, security and other functional fiberglass industrial felt products have developed rapidly.
(2) Electronic felt products:
According to data from the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology, my country's electronic information manufacturing industry grew rapidly in the first half of the year, and exports rebounded and stabilized. Among them, in the first half of the year, the total output of mobile phones in my country reached 751.77 million units, a year-on-year increase of 9.7%; microcomputers reached 157.30 million units, a year-on-year increase of 1.0%; integrated circuits reached 207.1 billion units, a year-on-year increase of 28.9%. In addition, the retail sales of household appliances and audio-visual equipment reached 448.7 billion yuan, a year-on-year increase of 3.1%. Against this background, the market supply and demand of glass fiber electronic felt cloth products remained basically stable, and the price of electronic cloth rebounded slightly.
(3) Glass fiber reinforced composite materials:
In the first half of the year, the output of glass fiber reinforced composite materials in my country increased by 15.2% year-on-year, far exceeding the 2.3% year-on-year growth of glass fiber yarn raw materials, and the overall market demand remained relatively stable. Among them, in the first half of the year, my country's new wind power installed capacity was 475.5 billion kilowatts, a year-on-year increase of 6.9%. In the first half of the year, the total output of automobiles was 13.96 million units, a year-on-year increase of 5.7%, of which the cumulative output of new energy vehicles was 4.903 million units, a year-on-year increase of 34.3%. At the same time, the photovoltaic new energy market used glass fiber reinforced composite materials on a large scale for the first time. In the first half of the year, the photovoltaic module market size of more than 10GW has been formed in the photovoltaic frame segment alone.
(II) Import and export situation
1. Export situation: continued to maintain a rapid growth trend
In the first half of the year, my country's cumulative export volume of glass fiber and products was 1.0513 million tons, up 14.48% year-on-year, 2.4 percentage points higher than the first quarter; the cumulative export value was US$1.423 billion, up 2.82% year-on-year. In recent years, as China's glass fiber industry continues to increase its investment in digitalization, greening and high-end empowerment, the comprehensive competitive advantages of China's glass fiber and products have gradually emerged, and the stickiness to foreign downstream customers has also gradually increased.
2. Import situation: the decline has narrowed
In the first half of the year, my country's cumulative import volume of glass fiber and products was 51,800 tons, down 7.50% year-on-year, and the decline narrowed by more than 15 percentage points compared with the first quarter; the cumulative import value was US$393 million, up 10.70% year-on-year. With the seasonal recovery of some domestic market segments in the second quarter, the import scale of glass fiber and products has increased compared with the first quarter.
(III) Economic performance of the industry
In the first half of the year, the main business income of the glass fiber and products industry above designated size decreased by 5.4% year-on-year, which was basically the same as the first quarter, but significantly narrowed compared with the whole of last year. The total profit of the industry decreased by 59.7% compared with the same period last year, and the decline narrowed by more than 10 percentage points compared with the first quarter. The sales profit margin of the industry in the first half of the year was 4.03%, which increased by nearly 1.5 percentage points compared with the end of the first quarter, reflecting that the overall profit level of the industry is still in a serious low state, but with the joint efforts of the whole industry, the situation has improved.
With the active contraction of the supply side and the seasonal recovery of the demand side, the major glass fiber yarn production enterprises basically achieved production and sales balance in the second quarter. Although the inventory of some enterprises is still higher than usual, after more than a year of supply and demand imbalance and low-price competition, stable growth has temporarily become the current industry consensus. Therefore, since the end of March, the price adjustment will first start from local small-batch products, and then gradually expand to the general increase in prices of major varieties of products, and then to the differentiated price increase of various high-end products such as thermoplastics and wind power. On this basis, the leading companies in the industry have gradually achieved profitability, but the majority of small and medium-sized enterprises, especially crucible wire drawing manufacturers, still have difficulty in operating because their production capacity is relatively dispersed and the downstream market is impacted by competition from pool kiln products.
