A Brief Analysis of Profit Contraction Pressure on Domestic Tinplate Manufacturers

　　Preface: In recent years, the profitability of the domestic tinplate market has experienced fluctuations, showing an overall contraction trend. By analyzing key data from January 2023 to August 2025, the gross profit of manufacturing enterprises declined continuously from a peak of 744.99 yuan/ton in March 2023 to 108.03 yuan/ton in August 2025, a drop of 85.5%. This trend is not caused by a single factor but is the result of the combined interaction of raw material costs, product prices, and market demand, with weak end-user demand being the main reason for the narrowing profit margin. The author will analyze this with specific data:

　　From the cost structure perspective, the production cost of tinplate mainly consists of hot-rolled C material and tin ingots. As shown in the chart, the comprehensive index of the tinplate substrate shows an overall fluctuating downward trend, falling from 4305.90 yuan/ton in January 2023 to 3608.50 yuan/ton in August 2025, a decrease of about 16%. This downward trend theoretically should bring cost advantages to manufacturers, but the simultaneous rise in tin ingot prices offset this advantage. Tin ingot prices rose from 219,583 yuan/ton in January 2023 to 268,274 yuan/ton in August 2025, an increase of over 22%. This caused the cost of tin ingots per ton of steel to increase from 807.27 yuan/ton to 986.27 yuan/ton, adding nearly 180 yuan/ton to production costs. The cost of tinplate was about 6080 yuan/ton at the beginning of 2023 and remained high at 5562 yuan/ton in August 2025, with limited cost reduction. Meanwhile, the average ex-factory price of tinplate continuously dropped from 6650 yuan/ton in January 2023 to 5670 yuan/ton in August 2025, a decrease of about 14.7%. This downward price trend contrasts sharply with the relatively firm cost side, squeezing the gross profit margin.

　　From the timeline perspective, profit levels were relatively high in the first half of 2023, especially peaking in March. During this period, raw material costs were relatively low, while product prices remained at a certain height, providing good profit margins for enterprises. However, starting from the second half of 2023, profit margins began to narrow, and by the second half of 2024, the decline in profits accelerated significantly. Since 2025, gross profits have hovered in a low range of 100-300 yuan/ton, indicating that the industry has entered a stage of minimal profits or even losses for some enterprises.

　　A deeper analysis of the reasons behind the profit decline shows that the primary factor is the mediocre performance of end-market demand. Tinplate is mainly used in industries such as chemicals, canned food, and beverage packaging, and the development speed of these industries directly determines the demand for tinplate. In recent years, with the slowdown in consumption growth and the substitution effect of new packaging materials like aluminum and plastics, the traditional market demand for tinplate has been weak. Insufficient demand has led to intensified market competition, forcing manufacturers to adopt price reduction strategies to maintain market share, making it difficult to pass on raw material cost increases to downstream customers through product price hikes.

　　Secondly, supply continues to increase, and manufacturers' ex-factory prices remain generally weak. As of the time of writing, according to Mysteel's monitoring of key tinplate manufacturers, the operating rate in August 2025 was 78%, with a capacity utilization rate of 79.86%. Actual tinplate production in August was 466,700 tons, a month-on-month increase of 2,200 tons, and the same factory inventory was 193,100 tons, a month-on-month increase of 1,800 tons. From January to August 2025, domestic tinplate cumulative output was 3.5402 million tons, an increase of about 3.60% compared to the same period last year. The improvement in production line capacity utilization combined with the release of new capacity means that the supply side needs to increase utilization rates to reduce per-ton production costs, while also engaging in fierce market competition by lowering product prices to benefit customers, failing to effectively convert this into enterprise profits.

　　In summary, the profit decline in the tinplate industry is the result of multiple factors. On the surface, it appears to be a mismatch between raw material costs and product prices, but at a deeper level, it reflects a weak industry supply-demand structure. The rise in tin ingot prices directly pushed up production costs, the decline in hot-rolled C material prices failed to effectively translate into enterprise profits, and the continuous drop in tinplate ex-factory prices reflects weak end-user demand. The future recovery of profitability in the tinplate industry will not only require coordination on the raw material cost side but will also depend on the resilience of downstream demand and the industry's own structural adjustment and upgrading process.