Refrigerant Price Situation in the Peak Hot Summer

The hot summer has arrived, but the price of refrigerants is falling. The latest data shows that in addition to the relatively stable price of R22, the market prices of mainstream refrigerants including R32, R125 and R134a have recently declined to varying degrees. Among them, the market price of R125 even fell by more than 2,000 yuan / ton within a month.

In this regard, an executive of a refrigerant-related listed company revealed: "Although refrigerants are not strong cyclical chemicals, they are still affected by seasonal factors. (Downstream) manufacturers usually stock up early in the first quarter, and orders from refrigerant companies will be relatively reduced in the summer. In addition, in recent years, the product strategies of mainstream air conditioning companies have tended to be consistent, and in the face of the increase in downstream demand brought about by high temperature weather, enterprises usually do not immediately increase their production scheduling plans to prevent the increase of channel and inventory risks. ”

"In fact, the situation in recent years is similar, last year's high temperature weather in many regional markets across the country also saw air conditioning sales out of stock, installer orders full, but the overall production and sales scale of the refrigerant industry has not changed much." An air-conditioning retailer in Shandong told reporters that the current downstream demand for refrigerants is difficult to significantly improve in the short term, and the anhydrous hydrofluoric acid, trichloroethylene and tetrachloroethylene enterprises on the cost side also have certain inventory pressure, and under the double negative of cost and demand, various types of refrigerants (prices) are expected to continue to decline in the short term.

Refrigerant prices fell, and corporate earnings narrowed month-on-month, but still better than the same period last year.

Longzhong information statistics show that up to now, the theoretical profit of R32 is 400 yuan / ton, and it can reach 1600 yuan / ton in the same period in March this year; The theoretical profit margin of R134a also fell from more than 2800 yuan / ton in the same period in March to around 2200 yuan / ton.

"At present, the second-generation refrigerant is mostly used as a chemical raw material, and the refrigerants used in the refrigerant are mainly third-generation refrigerant HFCs (including R32, R125, R134a, etc.). In recent years, HFCs products have been affected by the quota benchmark, the supply of the industry has continued to increase, and many products have shown a phenomenon of inverted profits. A leading brokerage chemical industry analyst told reporters that last year, R32 had an average annual profit of -4300 yuan / ton, and R134a was about -3600 yuan / ton.

This year, the situation of refrigerant companies producing at high capacity to fight for quotas has improved. The relevant person in charge of FRIOFLOR Group once said in an interview with a reporter from CaiLian News Agency: Although the current national quota for the third-generation refrigerant has not yet been announced, but now the company has set production according to market supply and demand, and loss-making production will definitely not have, at least to ensure a certain profit.

For the industry prospects, many industry insiders expressed optimism.

"After the quota implementation starts next year, the capacity exceeding the quota can only be withdrawn, and the supply and demand pattern of the industry will be reversed." The aforementioned business people said that the short-term fluctuation will not change the overall upward trend of the refrigerant industry, now in the off-season market, enterprises can still maintain a certain level of profits, with the consumption of industry inventory and demand recovery, the future refrigerant market supply situation may be inevitable.