Polyester market encounters heavier pressure amid tumbling oil price

The COVID-19 outbreak has swept across the world, affecting many industry worldwide. One hundred and one countries and regions have reported confirmed cases of COVID-19 as of Sunday morning, World Health Organization (WHO) spokesperson Fadela Chaib told Xinhua. A total of 105,427 confirmed cases were reported globally as of 6:00 CET (0500 GMT) Sunday, among which 3,583 patients have died, the spokesperson said. The influence of worldwide pandemic is not smaller than that of a global financial crisis. The global market was in "chaos". Overseas stock market collapsed, and the OPEC+ failed to reach an output cut deal. Price of international oil plunged on Monday, with WTI crude oil price down to $30/bbl, and the whole world was in panic. The COVID-19 outbreak directly affected the end-user demand and rapidly transferred to upward market, resulting into high inventory of the whole polyester chain. The high stocks of polyester products were greatly devaluated after oil price collapsed, intensifying the pressure of the industry.

Worldwide epidemic spread drags down end-user demand
In view of domestic demand, the retail sales of apparels were substantially impacted by the COVID-19 outbreak. Many branded apparel companies chose to close the shop temporarily or curtail the running time to reduce losses. Sales of apparels were supposed to be sound near the Spring Festival holiday and back-to-school season, while sales were almost in stagnation, leading to piling up stocks in apparel enterprises. Inventory of winter wear accumulated, and sales of spring cloth were stunted too. Opening door to restart business meant losses for many apparel companies. Therefore, many companies started turning attention to online sales to reduce losses. Many apparel companies still focused on traditional marketing channel although the layout of ecommerce increased. Thus, the spread of COVID-19 substantially impacted domestic sales of apparels.