According to the monitoring of SunSirs, the domestic methanol market in 2022 showed an "M" trend, with two "ups and downs" cycles throughout the year. The price at the beginning of 2022 was 2,375 RMB/ton, and the average market price of domestic methanol in East China by the end of December 31, 2022 was 2,698 RMB/ton, up 13.61% in the year. The two price "highs" appeared at the end of the first quarter and the middle of the third quarter. The highest price was 3,246.67 RMB/ton on October 8, and the lowest price was 2,315 RMB/ton on July 15, with the annual maximum amplitude of 40.24%.
According to the monitoring of SunSirs, the methanol market in 2022 was relatively stable compared with that in 2021. In 2021, the methanol market has been "soaring", reaching the "highest point" of the monitoring data in the past five years. In 2022, the methanol market was constrained by the contradiction between supply and demand, and hesitated. The trend of methanol market in 2020 and 2019 was similar.
Basically, in terms of capacity and output, the methanol output in 2022 was expected to reach 76.15 million tons, with a year-on-year increase of 4%, and the growth continues, but the growth rate was lower than that in 2021. Over 4 million tons of new capacity were put into production thwas year, contributing to the growth of production. The new units are mainly concentrated in the northwest region, of which the Jiutai unit in Inner Mongolia has the largest scale, with a capacity of more than 2 million tons/year. Some products are supplied to the Jiutai olefin unit, and the original demand for outsourcing of the Jiutai olefin unit was reduced, which has an impact on the methanol export market.
In terms of import and export, China's methanol import and export trade will still be dominated by imports in 2022. As of November 2022, the cumulative import of methanol from January to November was 11.23 million tons, up 6.5% year on year. If the estimated import volume in December was added, the cumulative import volume for the whole year was about 12.43 million tons, up 11% from 2021, but will be lower than the level of 2020. From January to November, the cumulative export of methanol was 170,000 tons, a decrease of 54% compared with the import scale.
From the perspective of the industrial chain, the price of coal was an important factor affecting the methanol market in terms of cost. In 2022, the price of coal was a positive factor, and the cost supports the increase of the methanol market. Among the downstream products, the products with a large demand for methanol are formaldehyde, dimethyl ether, acetic acid and MTBE. According to the rise and fall chart of methanol industrial chain products monitored by the business community, most of the methanol downstream products showed a significant decline throughout the year, dragging the decline of the methanol market on the demand side.
In the future, at present, the contradiction between supply and demand in the domestic methanol market is prominent, but from the end of 2022 to the first half of 2023, the domestic upstream large units have been put into operation successively, the downstream demand growth is facing risks, and the olefins will still bear the pressure of loss. The traditional downstream demand increase is relatively limited, the supply and demand expectation is relatively weak, and the port inventory is expected to gradually accumulate. However, on the other hand, it is also supported by the traditional peak season of spring maintenance, and the methanol market may recover slightly in the first quarter of 2023.
In the past five years, China's methanol market was mainly driven by the conversion between supply and demand, cost logic and macro logic. Due to the rising prices of upstream raw materials, the profits of methanol enterprises have been under continuous pressure. The characteristics of "low season from June to July and high season from September to October" are relatively obvious. The methanol analyst of the Business Society predicted that the methanol market in 2023 would still be dominated by shocks.
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