In a new weekly update pv magazineOPIS, a Dow Jones company, provides a quick overview of the most important price trends in the global solar industry.
Markets were sideways this week with several Asian countries including China taking a short break due to the May 1st Labor Day.
Lower-than-expected overseas demand helped keep CMM down for several weeks, but price movements were again mixed throughout the rest of the PV chain. The Global Polysilicon Marker (GPM), OPIS’ estimate of polysilicon produced outside China, fell to 3.01. % weekly to $35.831/kg.
Despite the drop in raw material costs, expectations of solid domestic demand in China may have helped offset subdued overseas demand for modules, preventing sellers from lowering bids for FOB China modules.
However, the price difference between the FOB China module and the FOB China M10 cell remained narrow at $0.084/W on May 2, down more than 30% from the January 12 peak of $0.123/W (see chart). The spread has remained below $0.10/W since January 31, indicating a sliding margin for non-integrated module producers. The command of n-type modules in the price range above p-type increases margins, but the availability of the former is so far largely limited to Tier-1 manufacturers.
OPIS, a Dow Jones company, provides energy prices, news, data and analysis on gasoline, diesel, jet fuel, LPG/NGL, coal, metals and chemicals, and renewable fuels and environmental commodities. It acquired pricing data assets from the Singapore Solar Exchange in 2022 and now publishes the OPIS APAC Solar Weekly report.
