SMM September 26 News:
This week, the operating rate for zinc oxide recorded 58.45%, up 0.34 percentage points WoW. Raw material side, as the National Day holiday approaches next week, some zinc oxide enterprises started pre-holiday stockpiling, driving a slight increase in raw material inventory. Finished product inventories side, affected by rising raw material prices and strong downstream sentiment to drive down prices, enterprises basically maintained a production-sales balance. Additionally, as major plants generally have no holiday arrangements during the vacation, finished product inventories remained largely flat compared with last week. Order side, demand from tyre factories in the rubber-grade zinc oxide segment was relatively stable recently, but end-use demand for ceramic-grade zinc oxide remained relatively weak, while demand for feed-grade and electronic-grade zinc oxide stayed relatively normal. The main reason for the continued rise in this week's operating rate was a slight improvement in end-use demand for some enterprises, which drove a small increase in operating rates. Currently, some enterprises are troubled by profit compression issues, coupled with the upcoming National Day holiday, and are expected to schedule holiday maintenance next week. The zinc oxide operating rate is expected to slightly decline next week, hovering around 57.96%.
