In March, the rubber and plastic market fell, showing a "non-resistance type of decline."

First of all, from the trend of SunSirs rubber and plastic index, the rubber and plastic index in March all the way down, during no signs of rebound. According to SunSirs, the rubber and plastic index at the beginning of march was 617 points, and the rubber and plastic index at the end of March 31 was 545 points, down 48.58% from the peak of 1060 points in the cycle (2012-March-14) and down 11.67% from the beginning of March (Note: Period from 2011-December-01 to 2013-April-30).

Secondly, from the point of view of products, the rubber and plastic list in March was not a single rise. All the 16 varieties monitored showed a trend of decline, with a rise and fall of -11.64% this month. 

Finally, in terms of range of rise and fall, the fall is larger. From the business of the rubber and plastic bulk list in March, the decline of more than 10% of the varieties accounted for 56.25% of the sector's monitored commodities, accounting for more than half of the monitored varieties. The top 3 products of decline are butadiene rubber (-19.29%), butadiene rubber (-19.08%), PA6(-17.36%).

There is a gap between the decline of the three major plate varieties. 

General Plastic: General plastic prices generally fell in March, the decline has been divided, only PP decline in 5%; LLDPE, PVC, PS, EPS and other products fell more than 10%. As of March 30, the general plastics index stood at 656, down 41.11% from a cyclical high of 1114. In particular,

The smallest PP decline was only 4.09%. First of all, the price of raw material propylene has fallen sharply. The price of propylene dropped from 6350 RMB/ton to 5,377 RMB/ton in March, down 15.32% on the whole. 

Secondly, as the manufacturing industry has not fully recovered, the polypropylene market is dragged down by the lack of demand in the downstream drawing and injection molding industries. 

Finally, the demand of downstream agricultural film market in the peak season of agricultural demand is picking up. 

Since March, the demand for agricultural film has increased by more than 30% compared with that of February. In addition, the demand for melt-spraying cloth is strong, which forms a certain support for polypropylene and alleviates the decline of polypropylene to a certain extent.

EPS fell the most, by 15.78%. In March, EPS was hit by the double blow of cost and demand, and the price went down all the way. According to SunSirs, the price of raw material PS in March dropped from 9333 RMB/ton at the beginning of the month to 7866 RMB/ton, down 15.72%. Affected by the outbreak of COVID-19 at the beginning of the year, the domestic real estate and home appliances industry started construction, production and sales are light, serious shortage of EPS demand, dragging the EPS market down significantly.

In terms of engineering plastics, the price of engineering plastics generally fell in March, with the smallest drop of PA66 (2.89%). 

The biggest drop was PA6, down 17.36%. According to SunSirs, as of March 30, the engineering plastics plate index is 596 points, from the peak of February 8, 2012 1013 points down 41.16% (Note: period from 2011-December-01 to date). Although both PA6 and PA66 fell, the declines were different, with one falling 17.36 percent and the other only 2.89 percent. 

On the one hand, the downstream textile and automobile industries of PA6 and PA66 are in a state of downturn, and the start of construction is not high. The demand side drags down both products. However, PA66 intermediate raw material adiponitrile enterprises have a relatively high monopoly price, so the price of PA66 is weakened by the impact of pure benzene and oil prices, which is also the reason why the price of PA66 has a relatively small decline in this round of crude oil.

In terms of rubber, the domestic rubber market in March is also in a downward trend. SunSirs shows that the monthly average increase and decrease of rubber in March is -14.16%. Among them nitrile rubber, natural rubber fell within 10%. Butadiene rubber, styrene butadiene rubber fell nearly 20%.

Natural rubber prices fell by 9.48 per cent in March. First of all, the demand of tire enterprises is greatly reduced: in March, domestic tire enterprises returned to work and production steadily. At first, the situation of domestic epidemic control was good, and the enterprise was positive. Later, the situation of foreign spread was rapid, which had a huge impact on the downstream orders. 

Second, replace glue cost downward glue put pressure on day: The current international crude oil tumbled, very direct effects on the chemical industry chain of goods, natural rubber butadiene cost caused by crude oil fell down cost, synthetic rubber, then because of some synthetic rubber can replace natural rubber in tire plant production, leading to low natural rubber prices down. 

Finally, as natural rubber is currently in the cut-off period and southeast Asian rubber producing countries have implemented control measures in response to covid-19 epidemic, the supply of natural rubber has provided some support to domestic natural rubber prices in the short term, which has alleviated the decline of natural rubber.

The prices of butadiene rubber and butadiene rubber fell by 19.29% and 19.08% respectively in March. 

Raw Material: By the influence of crude oil butadiene, styrene butadiene rubber raw material prices dropped significantly, the cost of synthetic rubber market drag. According to SunSirs, the price of raw material butadiene in March decreased from 6223 RMB/ton at the beginning of the month to 5127 RMB/ton at the end of the month, down 17.61% overall. In March, the price of styrene dropped from 6,700 RMB/ton at the beginning of the month to 4,650 RMB/ton at the end of the month, down 30.60% overall. 

Supply and Demand: The export of the downstream tire industry is blocked and the start of the downturn, the purchase of synthetic rubber is light, and the demand side of the strong pressure on the synthetic rubber market.

Rubber and plastic market may be at the bottom of the fluctuation phase

After the market, the business of rubber and plastic industry analysts believe that the rubber and plastic market trend in April still see raw materials and demand for two aspects. 

From the perspective of raw materials, crude oil, the source of the whole petrochemical industry chain, has already fallen below the cost line of shale oil in the United States, and now it has also fallen to the cost line of Russian crude oil after the slump since mid-February. The probability of further decline is not large.

From the demand side, although the domestic efforts to resume production continue to increase, but the impact of the epidemic abroad is still more serious. In addition to the epidemic prevention materials export products may continue to be blocked, adverse to the domestic export enterprises and export product chain recovery, rubber and plastic market demand in April is still difficult to show clear signs of optimism. Overall, if crude oil does not rise significantly in April rubber and plastic market will still be at the bottom of the shock stage.

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