Background: By the end of the 2025 Spring Festival holiday, the PVC industry inventory saw a continuation of the destocking trend. Although domestic downstream demand resumed, the storage volumes and order pressures in downstream processing enterprises made it difficult to rapidly accelerate the destocking process. From January to February, PVC export shipments surged to 610,000 tons, an 85% increase year-over-year. The rapid growth in export demand effectively alleviated the supply-demand imbalance pressure during the holiday period, playing a positive role in the destocking of upstream inventories and the market.

One, impressive PVC exports, rush to export amid multiple policy pressures

Figure 1 PVC Export Trend Change in 2024-2025 (Unit: Million Tonnes)

Despite the impact of the Spring Festival on PVC export deliveries in January, the year-on-year change in PVC exports still showed a strong performance. According to statistics, domestic PVC exports in January and February 2025 were 280,000 tons and 330,000 tons respectively, totaling 610,000 tons, a significant increase of 85% compared to the 330,000 tons in January-February last year.

The rapid and substantial increase in PVC exports is related to changes in global trade policies. The potential rise in prices and export risks due to additional tariffs imposed by the US, as well as the anti-dumping duties on imported PVC and BIS policies in India, have influenced foreign PVC traders and manufacturers to stock up and procure PVC materials in advance. Additionally, lower shipping costs accelerated the concentrated delivery of PVC exports. Since October 2024, following the rumors of tariff increases in the US and the import policy risks in India, various customers have started to procure and store goods in advance, leading to a significant year-over-year increase in exports.

2. India remains the primary export destination

In 2024, China's total PVC exports amounted to 2.6175 million tons, with the top five trading partners being India, Vietnam, Thailand, Nigeria, and Uzbekistan. The total exports to these five countries accounted for 68% of the export volume.

Figure 2 Structure Chart of PVC Export Main Destinations (Unit: 10,000 tons)

The main export trade partners in January-February 2025, including India, Nigeria, Vietnam, Thailand, and others, remained unchanged. Among them, India accounted for over 43% of PVC exports, making it the largest destination for China's PVC exports.

III. PVC Export Deliveries Remain High, Facilitating Domestic Inventory Reduction

Figure 3 Comparison of Changes in Domestic PVC Industry Inventory and Export Delivery Volume (Unit: 10,000 tons)

As shown in Figure 3, excluding the impact of the Spring Festival in February when PVC industry inventory surged rapidly, the overall PVC industry inventory has been on a steady decline, while PVC exports have correspondingly shown a steady increase. Apart from the Spring Festival effect in February, domestic demand has remained relatively stable in other months. This indicates that both the total volume and the incremental growth of PVC exports have a direct impact on the domestic PVC industry inventory.

The PVC exports are expected to maintain a high delivery volume in March and April. According to the statistics of Longzhong Data, there is still a window period for PVC exports to India before the anti-dumping duties on imported PVC in India take effect in May and before the impact of BIS on shipping schedules in May. Considering the rainy season in Southeast Asia and India, the main PVC consuming regions, which will start in May and June and lead to an off-season, the short-term increase in PVC exports will continue to help reduce the inventory in the PVC industry.