Low Capacity Utilization in Glass Industry Goes Against Prices Rise

The newly built production lines for glass were ten in 2015. Production lines for cold repair were 43 and for recovery were 18. The actual capacity was on the decline. This year there is another one glass production line and the number of production lines for cold repair is five and for cold repair recovery is one.

So far the capacity utilization rate of glass has been 68.36% down by 4.8% on the previous year, which fell to a low record. The capacity of glass in the full containers is 850,020,000, down by of 27,540,000 on the last year. As the result of low capacity utilization glass prices are hardly on the rise. If glass prices keep increasing and the cold repair production line is in recovery, the balanced situation of glass supply and demand in a short time will be broken.

The glass industry keeps a large stock of glass products since last December. For instance, the stock of flat glass reaches 3,470,000 in full containers, which is more than that of last year. Under the condition of decreased production and increased stock, the glass market is in a weak state.  Fortunately, with the approaching glass season and a recovery in real estate market, the stock of glass is much likely to decrease.

In general, there are two reasons for the rise of glass price. Firstly, the real estate sales are in good conditions. Secondly, the bulk commodities increase systematically on the whole. We believe that the glass has little chance to rise sharply in the short term.