JPN Electric Cable Shipment Slightly Recovers for Cars and Appliances

Japanese domestic shipment of electric wire and cable was quickly estimated at 52,200 tonnes of copper in April, down by 26.3% from a year earlier and down by 1.9% from a previous month, announced by Japanese Electric Wire & Cable Makers’ Association on 21 April. The demand maintained stagnant from construction market, where the most volume of copper is consumed. Meanwhile the shipment bottomed out for automobiles and electric appliances after February. The actual shipment of optical fiber products decreased by 32.9% to 2.58 million kilometers of fiber core in March from a year earlier.

The shipment for the construction field and related wholesalers kept below 25,000 tonnes per month for 4 straight months due to the stagnancy in private sectors’ expenditures and domestic housing market. The shipment maintains lower by about 20% than 30,000 tonnes per month, the indicating level of the demand condition.

The shipment for automobiles and electric appliances represented month-to-month recovery for 2 months in a row despite of 40-50% year-on-year decline. The shipment seemed to turn upward slightly thanks to the output increase by automakers and electric appliance makers.

The shipment of optical fiber products decreased by 21.3% to 2.02 million kilometers of fiber core for export in March from a year earlier and dropped by 56.3% to 553,173 kilometers of fiber core for domestic market. The export showed year-to-year decline for 5 months in a row, along which the total shipment represented year-to-year decrease for 5 straight months.