Polyester downstream market embraces suddenly better business amid colder weather?

This week's CCFGroup survey about downstream market is completely different from last week. The market seemed to start weakening last week but the business of thermal apparel and home textiles is moderate this week after the weather turns colder. From a regional point of view, the down jacket fabric on Wujiang water-jet looms is quite popular, especially the lining fabric, which is used as lining material, the price has soared, with increment as high as 0.2 yuan per meter, and the profit is also very considerable. Several lining fabric enterprises even said that they are out of stock. As the ideal fabric of down jacket, high-density polyester pongee, 480T and 310T nylon taffeta sell better as well. The warehouse of some dyeing factories who are related to the fabrics and lining of down jacket is full.

In addition to hot sales of water-jet down jacket fabrics and lining, sales of knitted velvet thermal fabrics also significantly increase this week. Sales of warp-knitted velvet fabrics improve this week in Haining. Some large warp knitting plants reflect that it is their busiest time year to date. The inventory of conventional warp-knitted fabrics has decreased to yearly low and some are even out of stock. The business of warp-knitted velvet fabrics also grows in Changshu this week. Sales of milk velvet and flannel fabrics for home textiles and home dress are sound. The online sales of home dress are also hot. The stocks of warp-knitted fabrics decline to yearly low and some plants even do not have inventory at hand. Sales of circular-knitted imitation super soft fabric are sound recently in Shaoxing and plants witness rising run rate. However, the business of conventional fabrics for home textiles presents mediocre. The water-jet mills in Changxing who concentrate on conventional fabrics for home textiles do not see better business.

The orders of downstream market apparently improve over last week and hit yearly high this week. By convention, downstream business will rarely grow in the second half of Nov. Sales of winter apparels were bad when the temperature was high after the National Day holiday. Coupled with falling feedstock prices, sales of fabrics for winter apparels were modest. Based on the order index from CCFGroup, the orders really recovered modestly after the National Day holiday and the strength was apparently lower than the same period of past years. The weather is turning colder recently, coupled with stabilizing prices of raw materials, sales of fabrics for thermal apparels and home textiles apparently increase, mainly domestic sales. Export orders still fail to grow. That means downstream business has improved periodically. The inventory of grey fabrics declines to 21.4 days, hitting yearly low, and the operating rate of fabric mills rises by 3 percentage points on the week to 82%, the yearly high. Some dyeing plants witness better business, mainly in Shengze and Changshu in Jiangsu, with run rate up by 3 percentage points week on week to 79%.

How long will this round of better business caused by colder weather last remains uncertain. Some downstream players expect it to be continued into end-Nov.