Silicone

DMC price was in steep fall in this week. Some silicone monomer producers resumed operation. As the downstream market maintained sluggish demand,  silicone monomer producers lowered their selling prices. The price of silicon metal went on falling. The price of methyl chloride rose before falling, and that of methanol was down. The production cost of DMC reduced. This week, the production cost decreased with the falling price of raw materials. The prices of OH polymer, gum, silicone fluid and HCR mostly fell one after another. The silicone monomer manufacturers raised their operating rate to some extent, meanwhile, the downstream players was in sluggish demand for DMC. The silicone price is expected to stay stable but a bit down in the short term.

Fumed silica

This week, the domestic market price of fumed silica fell, the enterprises offered declining prices. In terms of upstream raw materials, the prices of silicon tetrachloride (STC) and monomethyltrichlorosilane (MTCS) generally stabilized, the production cost almost unchanged. The demand for fumed silica in the downstream markets was still sluggish in this week. The downstream firms purchased fumed silica on rigid demand. As the fumed silica production capacity has significantly increased in recent years, the market supply exceeded demand. Enterprises had to promote sale with low profits. Due to price decline, companies may extend the duration of overhaul. In the short term, the fumed silica market will be relatively weak.

Silicon metal 

The price of silicon metal declined overall this week. On the supply side: most of the domestic silicon metal producers suffered a loss due to the continuously felling price of silicon metal. As of this week, some silicon metal factories in Xinjiang have also stopped production for maintenance after the large-scale overhaul happening to the counterparts in the southwest China. On the demand side: The downstream players kept weak demand for silicon metal. Silicone monomer producers had a low operating rate. The shipment of aluminium alloy producers was not smooth in early May. Aluminium processing factories generally purchased silicon metal on rigid demand. Although polysilicon producers released the new capacity, they purchased silicon metal by lowering price to much extent, with the price decline in the photovoltaic industrial chain.

Polysilicon 

The market price of polysilicon dropped to a great extent in this week, with a few transactions done. On the supply side, some leading enterprises had unstable product quality during the raising production capacity, and listed companies had performance pressure, resulting in relatively low selling prices. On the demand side, the silicon chips buyers and the battery ones reduced the inventory, aiming to avoid losses caused by significant fluctuations in raw material prices, and they had the sluggish demand for polysilicon in the short period. Based upon the above perspective, it is expected that future price of polysilicon will depend on production schedule, supply of quartz crucibles and terminal market demand.