[Market information]：What affects the price of acrylonitrile and what is the price trend of acrylonitrile in 2022?

2017-2021, acrylic nitrile mainstream market prices show an upward trend of rising-falling-fluctuating. The price influencing factors cannot naturally be separated from several major factors such as cost side, supply side and demand side. Today, the price influencing logic will be briefly analyzed.

Factors affecting acrylonitrile price can be divided into the following aspects: cost side (raw material propylene, synthetic ammonia), supply side (acrylic nitrile price), demand side (three main downstream ABS, acrylic fiber, the output and export volume of acrylamide). According to the above figure, we can see intuitively that in the relevant aspects, cheng the correlation between the change of raw material price and acrylonitrile price is relatively high. Among them, the price correlation coefficient between the main raw material propylene and acrylic nitrile in the past five years is as high as 0.81, followed by synthetic ammonia. In the fundamentals, although the yield of acrylamide has a high correlation with acrylic nitrile price, it more reflects the influence of acrylonitrile price changes on acrylamide. However, the correlation coefficient between acrylonitrile export volume and acrylic nitrile price with high market attention is as high as 0.63, which also reflects that export has more and more obvious influence on the price of domestic goods after the expansion of acrylic nitrile production capacity.

Cost: at present, there are 11 acrylic nitrile production plants in our country, of which only Shandong koruer and Shandong Haijiang River have no own matching of raw material propylene, and the matching rate of propylene is as high as over 80%, among them, the correlation of propylene, the main raw material, is higher, which is more prominent in 202020. In 2020, the new acrylonitrile Zhejiang Petrochemical plant was expected to be put into operation, and then public health events were superimposed to affect the terminal demand of acrylonitrile, while the main downstream demand of propylene continued. The prices of acrylonitrile and propylene, the main raw material, once upside down, the profit space of acrylonitrile factory is obviously squeezed, and the cost support is more and more obvious. Since entering 2021, the supply support of acrylonitrile at home and abroad has been significantly enhanced, and the impact on the cost side has weakened in stages. However, with the production of new acrylonitrile units in the fourth quarter, the impact on the cost side is expected to increase.

From the basic situation of supply and demand, we can see from the correlation analysis between the output of each product and the price of acrylonitrile that the correlation between acrylonitrile itself and the output of main downstream products is relatively low. The reason must be analyzed from the evolution of acrylonitrile supply and demand fundamentals.

In 2017, Qilu Petrochemical acrylic nitrile plant stopped production, acrylic nitrile supply gap increased, and the market was in a state of short supply. Although from 2018, 130,000 tons of Haijiang in Shandong province, 260,000 tons of Jiangsu silbang Phase II, 260,000 tons of Zhejiang Petrochemical Phase I, 260,000 tons of Zhejiang Petrochemical Phase II and other new devices have been put into operation gradually, however, the situation that other factories stop production and overhaul in each year occurs from time to time, and the situation of foreign acrylonitrile force majeure and so on, so the supply-side factories have a heavier say in acrylic nitrile price, as a result, the correlation between product prices and fundamental factors is relatively low.

From the next 11 to 12 months, the demand for downstream acrylic fibers will enter the off season, while the plant load of some acrylamide factories will recover slightly. However, the new acrylonitrile plant is expected to be put into operation, although both the supply side and the main downstream demand side are expected to increase after falling, the demand growth rate is expected to be less than the supply growth rate, acrylic nitrile prices are expected to decline.

In addition, with the release of acrylic nitrile production capacity, exports are expected to continue to increase, and export demand also has a significant impact on acrylic nitrile prices.

Judging from the price trend expectation of acrylonitrile in 2022, 850,000 tons of new production capacity is expected to be released in 2022. In 2022, the production pace of ABS in the main downstream is expected to accelerate, and it is expected that more than 3 million tons of new production capacity will be put into operation, although the consumption of acrylonitrile can increase by more than 600,000 tons. However, as the new production capacity of ABS is mostly concentrated in the second half of next year, the impact of acrylonitrile cost and basic price will be further deepened, and the operating range of the overall price of acrylonitrile in 2022 may be less than that in 2021.