Trade war consequences not expected until March
Taiwanese manufacturers remain conservative in their attitudes toward shipments after Chinese Lunar New Year. This is partly due to the US-China trade war and the end of fiscal year in Japan. However, according to EnergyTrend, a research division of TrendForce, major Chinese and Taiwanese manufacturers will maintain regular shipment and some will even accelerate shipments to the US and Japan. Sales revenue may still be high in February. It's projected that the US-China trade war's impact on Taiwanese manufacturers won't begin to show until March.
EnergyTrend's data indicates that major manufacturers, such as Trina Solar, Yingli, Renesola, Canadian Solar, and Jinko Solar, have placed 60MW-90MW of orders to Taiwanese manufacturers. "Bargaining process was completed for 80% of February orders in January and none of the orders have been cancelled. It somehow accelerate shipments to the US and Japan in February. In addition, the total orders received exceed 110MW for just two manufacturers in Northern Taiwan in February," said Arthur Hsu, research manager of EnergyTrend.
Although more orders have been placed in February, price may be revised downward. "Clients have requested cell and wafer manufacturers to reduce cost, with range being 3%-5%. Since bargaining process has been completed for most February orders, production utilization rate also increased. While manufacturers accelerate shipments to the US and Japan in February, shipments to these regions is projected to decline in March due to the US-China trade war and the end of fiscal year in Japan," added Hsu.
In terms of last week's spot market, buyers and sellers had different opinions regarding future price. Buyers have started to request for cost-down, meanwhile, sellers acted as if they didn't hear buyers' request. On the other hand, the status for US-China trade war won't be clear until mid-February or even mid-June. Therefore, manufacturers were conservative about orders in March, and hence led to recent price stagnation.
Last week's poly, module, and cell price remained steady. For multi-si wafers, because clients have placed more orders in February, certain buyers have accepted the new February quotation while sellers insisted to keep the price unchanged. Last week's average price came to US$1.014/piece, a 0.8% rise. For mono-si wafers, price still fluctuated and demand slightly increased, with last week's average price reaching US$1.171/piece, a 0.09% rise.
