s China phases out its Golden Sun incentive scheme to promote distributed solar, the new scheme increases difficulty to system developers in securing their electricity buyers; therefore, deployment of new PV project in the country is slow.

In China, weak system deployment pressures its domestic module demand and pricing. As China phases out its Golden Sun incentive scheme to promote distributed solar, the new scheme increases difficulty to system developers in securing their electricity buyers; therefore, deployment of new PV project in the country is slow. On the other hand, since Japan cuts the FIT recently, Japanese system developers request lower pricing modules to maintain its IRR level. In the EU, minimum price floor requirement for Chinese modules drop from euro 0.56/watt to euro 0.53/watt. As such, overall module prices in the EU drop. Although PV system demand and module pricing in the US is stable, overall module price still remains on the downtrend this week.

Overall cell price remains on the downtrend this week. Chinese cell makers face increasing price cut pressure under the weak module pricing in the country. Taiwanese cell companies maintain two pricing strategies by raising their prices to Chinese buyers while lower their prices to EU/Japanese buyers. With solid demand from China until May, Taiwanese companies raise their prices in expectation of demand loss from China once the US antidumping case is announced. On the other hand, Taiwanese cell companies cut price for non-Chinese companies to secure future order once China reduces its procurement from Taiwan. Mono cells also experience increasing price cut pressure. Since mono cells have better margins, they have more room for price cuts.

Multi wafer price continues on the downtrend this week. Weak downstream demand in China pressures its domestic wafer pricing and demand. In Taiwan, wafer companies face increasing price cut pressure as cell companies remain conservative on placing orders and wait for further price drop. In addition, wafer companies still maintain high utilization creating excess supply adding on the wafer price cut. For mono wafers, demand is quite solid from Japan and EU. With less price pressure from polysilicon, mono wafer are able to maintain stable pricing.

Polysilicon prices remain stable this week. With the solar component pricing downtrend, transaction of spot polysilicon is more limited with stable pricing. In China, some polysilicon are already traded below 160RMB/kg. However, for first tier polysilicon, prices remain stable as wafer companies still maintain high utilization consuming constant polysilicon amount.