Analysis of investment sensitivity in China's chemical fiber industry

At present, the unbalanced development between supply and demand has become a prominent contradiction in the chemical fiber industry. There are still many adverse factors facing the recovery of the world economy, and the growth of demand for textiles and clothing is still facing many tests. With a series of national policies of "expanding domestic demand and stabilizing growth", the recovery of textile and apparel consumption has positive support, but it is undeniable that we have passed the "food and clothing" stage, and quality consumption has replaced quantity consumption to become the mainstream of the market. Therefore, if the production capacity of chemical fiber continues to maintain rapid growth, the contradiction with the imbalance of the terminal market will become more prominent.

Purpose and significance

Structural overcapacity in some areas of the chemical fiber industry is an unavoidable problem at the current stage. In recent years, on the basis of continuously tracking the operation and development of the industry, the China Chemical Fiber Association has studied and introduced the "Investment Sensitivity Analysis of the Chemical Fiber Industry". This revision is to indicate new investment risks and changes, provide reference for chemical fiber enterprises and investment institutions, and guide enterprises to rational investment, avoid blind expansion, and further promote the supply-side structural reform of the chemical fiber industry. Promote high-quality development of the industry.

Third, focus on the content

Compared with the 2020 edition, the analysis level of the 2023 edition remains unchanged, the description of some risk conditions has been improved, and the risk condition tips of some industries have been added.

This revision mainly focuses on risks from the market level. In recent years, with the progress of technology and equipment in the chemical fiber industry and the improvement of automation and intelligence level, the capacity scale of a single project is large, so the new project has a greater impact on the market. Focus on the following industries:

PTA: With the development of refining and chemical integration projects, and some polyester enterprises to extend the industrial chain, since the "14th Five-Year Plan", the PTA industry ushered in a new round of production capacity cycle, the rapid increase of PTA production capacity led to an increase in market supply pressure, capacity utilization declined. According to existing public information, there are nearly 20 million tons of PTA new equipment planned to be put into operation in 2023, if the new equipment is put into operation as scheduled, it will further aggravate the contradiction of oversupply.

Polyester filament: Polyester filament is a wide range of industries, although this revision does not increase the risk conditions of polyester filament, but its risk of excess capacity is rapidly increasing. In 2022, in addition to the impact of epidemic prevention and control and oil price fluctuations, the mismatch between supply and demand is the main contradiction facing the industry. In terms of civilian filament, the new production capacity in 2020 and 2021 exceeded 3 million tons, and there were still more than 2 million tons of new production capacity in 2022 when many projects were delayed. In terms of industrial silk, the production capacity of the "13th Five-Year Plan" period has basically maintained a steady annual growth of 7%, but since 2020, more than 200,000 tons/year of projects have been put into production, and the total scale of the industry is only more than two million tons, and market competition has intensified rapidly. Moreover, in the late period of the "14th Five-Year Plan", there are still more devices planned in the field of civilian filament and industrial silk, but the demand side is difficult to see the hope of matching growth, and it is not appropriate to continue to rapidly increase production capacity.

Polyester staple fiber: Before the middle of the "13th Five-Year Plan", the production capacity of polyester staple fiber was basically stable at about 7 million tons, and the industry was relatively stable. However, from the middle and late period of the "13th Five-Year Plan", as some filament enterprises began to lay out the field of staple fiber, the growth of polyester staple fiber production capacity accelerated significantly. Compared with polyester filament, the short fiber market capacity is relatively small and stable, and most of the new projects are large, which has a greater impact on the short fiber market.

High-performance fiber and bio-based fiber: The high-performance fiber and bio-based fiber industry is an important part of the emerging strategic materials field in China, and has been concerned by investors inside and outside the industry. However, some industries are still in the early stage of development, and there is still a lot of room for technological progress, which means that there is a risk that investment will soon become backward technology and backward production capacity. At the same time, due to the lack of downstream application technology development, many varieties of terminal markets have not been fully opened, and the risk of blind new production capacity is great at this time.