SMM November 28 News:
This week, the operating rate for zinc oxide recorded 57.37%, up 0.12 percentage points WoW. Raw material side, zinc prices maintained a fluctuating trend this week; zinc oxide enterprises made just-in-time procurement and continuously picked up goods, driving a slight increase in raw material inventory this week. However, recently, prices of some recycled raw materials remained high, and enterprises still faced significant cost pressure. In terms of finished product inventories, due to a slowdown in end-use demand in some sectors, finished zinc oxide inventories rose slightly this week. The slight increase in the zinc oxide operating rate this week was mainly because some enterprises slightly increased production to meet downstream demand, thus driving the operating rate up slightly. Regarding end-user orders, demand for electronic-grade zinc oxide remained relatively good recently, driven by power grid investments, orders for lightning arrester valve sheets were relatively prominent. For ceramic-grade zinc oxide, although some enterprises reported that the pace of order quantities from certain end-users accelerated recently, at the same time, enterprise profits were significantly compressed. In the feed-grade zinc oxide sector, affected by low pig prices, demand also weakened slightly. For rubber-grade zinc oxide, orders from end-user tire factories remained relatively stable overall. Due to relatively stable demand in the rubber-grade zinc oxide sector, coupled with continued support from electronic-grade zinc oxide orders, it is expected that the operating rate of zinc oxide enterprises will maintain a fluctuating trend around 57.38% next week.
