Xinte highlights Chinese polysilicon ‘oligopoly’

The global dominance of a small number of Chinese polysilicon companies has been highlighted by one of the giants, Xinte Energy, in its latest annual figures.

The TBEA-owned business predicted further consolidation of the industry which makes the raw material for solar panels, noting that amid “increasingly fierce” competition, businesses “with outdated technologies and higher costs will gradually be eliminated by the market.” That market, said Xinte, displays “a well-defined oligopoly competition pattern.”

Hong Kong-listed Xinte is an exemplar of the industry, with its latest impressive set of returns being largely generated by the additional 36,000-tons-per-year capacity of production lines it brought into play last year.

That new fab saw Xinte manufacture 66,300 tons of poly last year, 87% more than it sent out through the factory doors in 2019, and helped the business to a 73% rise in net profit, to RMB695 million (US$106 million), on the back of revenue which, at RMB13.5 billion (US$2.05 billion), was up 55%, year-on-year.

With four-year supply deals for 367,200 tons of polysilicon inked with solar manufacturers JA Solar and Longi in September and December, the resulting regular revenue stream will give Xinte added confidence as it presses ahead with more ambitious plans for 100,000 tons more annual production capacity in Baotou City, in the autonomous region of Inner Mongolia.

Xinte was also keen to mention technological progress, as displayed by patent prizes it secured in the Xinjiang Uygur autonomous region, and its solar project development and management operation. The company’s solar portfolio includes a 300 MW unsubsidized ‘grid parity‘ solar plant in a former coal mining area of Jiaokou county, Shanxi province.

With most of the numbers going the right way–even if cash reserves shrank from RMB2.75 billion (US$418 million) to RMB1.77 billion, from 2019–Xinte confidently stated: “The low carbon energy transition is an irresistible trend.”