my country’s SBS overall has overcapacity and the number of companies is small

SBS, the full name of styrene-butadiene-styrene in Chinese, is a tri-block copolymer with isoprene or butadiene and styrene as monomers. It is a new type of thermoplastic elastomer polymer. SBS has the advantages of high tensile strength, easy processing, good air permeability and wet slip resistance. It can show high rubber elasticity at normal temperatures and can be plasticized and molded at high temperatures. Therefore, it is also called the third generation of synthetic rubber. SBS has a wide range of applications and is mostly used in resin modifiers, asphalt modifiers, waterproofing membranes, adhesives, shoemaking and other fields.

At present, our country has formed a complete SBS industry chain. The upstream of the industrial chain is mainly raw material suppliers, providing styrene, butadiene and other raw materials; the midstream is mainly SBS manufacturers, manufacturing through coupling method, monomer sequential feeding method, mixed monomer copolymerization and other production processes; the downstream is mainly SBS manufacturers. For application fields, it is mostly used in the footwear industry, asphalt modifiers, resin modifiers, adhesives and other fields.

At this stage, my country has become the world’s largest footwear producer and the largest footwear consumer market. Because soles made of SBS have excellent wear resistance, breathability, elasticity and comfortable wearing, and SBS sole waste can also be recycled. For recycling, the cost is lower. SBS has become one of the mainstream shoemaking materials, and the shoemaking industry has become the largest application field of SBS. However, due to the impact of the epidemic, my country’s shoemaking industry has also been affected to a certain extent, and corporate operating income has declined slightly. According to data released by the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology, for the whole of 2022, the operating income of leather, fur, feather and their products and shoemaking enterprises above designated size was 1.13399 billion yuan, a year-on-year decrease of 0.4%. As the footwear industry market gradually shrinks, the demand for SBS gradually decreases.

According to the “China SBS Industry Development Prospects and Investment Risk Avoidance Suggestions Report 2023-2027” released by the Industrial Research Center, in recent years In 2017, my country’s SBS market developed rapidly. However, as market demand became saturated, the overall production capacity was overcapacity and the operating rate gradually declined. According to the “2023 Key Petrochemical Product Production Capacity Early Warning Report” released by the Federation of Chemical Industry, my country’s SBS production capacity will decline slightly in 2022, from 1.620 million tons/year last year to 1.590 million tons/year; the output is about 877,000 tons. A year-on-year decrease of 7.4%; the average operating rate of equipment was 55.2%, a decrease of 3.3 percentage points.

Due to the overcapacity of domestic SBS, my country has gradually transformed from an SBS importer to an exporter, and SBS exports have grown rapidly. According to data released by the General Administration of Customs. From January to December 2022, my country’s SBS export volume reached 64,000 tons, and the export value reached 930 million yuan; the import volume was 24,000 tons, and the import value was 420 million yuan.

Industry analysts said that at this stage, there are only a small number of SBS manufacturers in my country. The major SBS manufacturers in my country include Sinopec, Changhong Hi-Tech, Ningbo Jinhai, Dushanzi Petrochemical, Li Changrong Rubber, Zhongli, etc. Among them, Li Changrong Rubber and Changhong Hi-Tech have relatively advanced technologies and high production capacity. They occupy the majority of the market share and have gradually become the leading companies.