PV Panel prices going up soon?

[Energetic]

We've spoken to a wholesaler yesterday who said things were beginning to creep upward now due to the weakness of the £sterling.

Are we at the bottom of the curve now? Couls we see another rush into the next tariff cut if coupled with rising prices?

 

[pvman]

We have already seen a price increase. I think there were some very good deals around while people cleared stock but now that is gone the price is going up.

Tom

 

[Ian-LS]

Seen increases of up to 4% with some of the major panel suppliers. Sign of things to come I think.

 

[SpitfireW'sale]

There is certainly some extra pressure on prices at the moment. There were a lot of people clearing stock at below cost leading up to the New Year as pvman said, which seems to have slowed. Currently we have the Euro becoming stronger against the pound.

A bigger concern (depending on your point of view) is the potential for a big price increase because of anti dumping duties on Chinese modules.

 

[SolarCity]

The prices of your ET panels look good, Spitfire.

 

[SpitfireW'sale]

Well, you have our number SC!!

 

[SolarCity]

As soon as our phone rings, I'll ring you!

 

[JulianC]

Ditto!

 

[Gavin A]

I wrote a blog post on this a few days back (are the 2013 solar panel price rises starting?).

We noticed a 2-4% rise in panel prices between Dec 2012 - now from a range of manufacturers from our main supplier, and according to one price tracking website there's been an across the board increase in silicon spot prices the 2 weeks in a row that I've been checking it, including a 10% increase for the lowest grade poly silicon. I've no idea at this stage if this is just a blip and there might have been an equivalent reduction before Christmas etc, or if this is part of a general upward trend.

One things pretty much certain though, which is that prices have to rise at some point once the oversupply situation resolves itself (via companies going bust or pulling out of the market or reducing output, and bankrupt stock being cleared off the docks etc and demand increasing), as virtually all solar manufacturers have been operating at a significantly loss for most of the last 18 months, and those operating at a profit are working on absolutely minute margins. My guess would be in the region of a 10-20% relatively across the board rise in panel prices by the middle of this year if the oversupply situation has resolved itself... or manufacturers are confident that they've built sufficient market share to be able to sneak prices up, as I suspect Canadian Solar in particular are now doing.

My conclusion fwiw, is that the answer to the question of when's the best time to buy solar systems is NOW. Prices are almost certainly going to rise this year, and FIT rates will fall by August at the latest, so now really is going to be the very bottom of the market price IMO.

 

[Worcester]

We tend to deal direct becasue of our volumes, the only reason we've seen for any chnage in pricing is the fact theat they work in Euros and Dollars.
We can almost exactly match the price changes against the £ / € vlaue changes.

As Spitfire says, any anti-dumping regulations / tariffs will have a much larger effect.

 

[Gavin A]

We tend to deal direct becasue of our volumes, the only reason we've seen for any chnage in pricing is the fact theat they work in Euros and Dollars.
We can almost exactly match the price changes against the £ / € vlaue changes.

yes, I did mean to mention that (have in the blog), it certainly could explain minor swings.

The overall picture this year though is that unless manufacturers are really able to cut their costs sufficiently to sustain these prices, then panel prices must rise so that the manufacturers can actually cover their operating costs. There's quite a lot of demand stimulation going on particularly in China which apparently accounted for 1/3 of global demand last quarter, up from 10% 2 years ago, and inventries are reported to be dropping (4% on average last quarter).

I could of course be wrong, there could remain enough companies willing to undercut anyone that does raise prices that the prices are forced to remain this low, or maybe they actually can reduce costs to a point where this price point works for them.

The other side of the issue is whether UK suppliers are going to have to raise their margins per panel due to the significantly reduced volumes - something's logically going to have to give if volumes remain so low relative to even the first quarter 2012, never mind last 2 quarters of 2011.

 

[solarfred]

My information is the Chinese are imposing an import tax on the raw silicon material imported from USA and EU right now because we are going to impose anti dumping tax on the finished goods in June. Isn't free enterprise great. No matter how hard you negotiate to get a competitive and reliable supply line some politician will jump in and screw it up for you. Seems to be a regular occurrence. Not a problem if were not in the EU as it happens. I am already working on the basis there will be barriers across EU borders this year and acting accordingly. Interesting year coming up I reckon.

 

[jason121]

Had this sent to me last Nov
HM Revenue & Customs

 

[solarfred]

An update on the anti dumping proposals.
EU to impose mandatory registration of Chinese solar goods | Solar Power Portal

Once the decision to impose registration is made the duty will be imposed retroactively. Any company importing solar panels will have to build in the prospective duty increase whatever that may be or take the hit but in effect no new orders will be placed from now on. The decision to start the registration process will be implemented with virtually no notice so anyone caught with goods on the high seas will have a cost of possibly +80% to take into account. The decision will be made in June as to whether the duty increase will be imposed. The actual duty rates will not be known until the end of the year.
Of course nothing may happen at all but it has effectively closed the Chinese trade link for 3 months.

 

[SRE]

Thanks for that - now I understand why all the Chinese imports are being cancelled.