On June 12, 2026, the textile bulk commodity price index edged down by 0.06%, but beneath this seemingly calm figure lies a clear divergence among different categories. Rayon yarn and cotton rose by 0.14% and 0.05% respectively, while raw silk plunged 0.68%, and polyester staple fiber and PTA also weakened. For practitioners across the textile supply chain, these signals are far more complex than surface-level movements: the tug-of-war between cost and demand is intensifying, and different raw materials are following their own independent trajectories.
Industrial Logic Behind the Price Movements
Year-on-year data shows PTA leading all monitored categories with a 35.62% increase, while polyester POY, FDY, and spandex all posted gains exceeding 15%. The core driver is cost transmission from crude oil price volatility coupled with tight PX supply. However, PTA's 0.18% daily decline on June 12 suggests that prices have approached a short-term peak, with downstream willingness to accept high prices waning.
In stark contrast, raw silk fell 7.7% year-on-year and recorded the largest daily decline. This weakness directly points to sluggish demand in the silk consumer market, especially for export orders. As a high-end fabric raw material, raw silk's decline often signals that downstream apparel brands are becoming cautious about high-priced products—a warning for industrial clusters in Huzhou, Zhejiang, and Suzhou, Jiangsu.
The slight rise in rayon yarn is more of a structural correction. While viscose staple fiber prices remained flat, rayon yarn inched up, indicating a localized recovery in demand for regenerated cellulose fibers, albeit limited. Cotton's 0.05% gain is negligible, but its 16.85% year-on-year increase underscores that cotton prices remain elevated, putting sustained cost pressure on cotton spinning mills, especially in major producing regions like Shandong and Henan.
Disruption and Reconstruction of the Transmission Chain
The most prominent feature of the current market is the mismatch between upstream cost push and downstream demand weakness. High prices for PTA and polyester staple fiber have not effectively passed through to yarn segments—polyester yarn prices were flat, and polyester POY, DTY, and FDY all failed to follow the uptrend, with FDY even dipping 0.09%. This indicates that overcapacity in the weaving sector is compressing profit margins, and mills are increasingly reluctant to purchase expensive raw materials.
This transmission bottleneck is particularly evident in intermediate links. Weaving clusters like Shengze and Keqiao have seen fluctuating operating rates recently, with some small and medium-sized mills reducing inventory cycles and adopting a just-in-time purchasing strategy. Meanwhile, cotton yarn 21S and 32S prices remained flat, with year-on-year gains of only about 5%, far below cotton's 16.85% increase. This means spinners are squeezed from both ends—high-priced cotton on one side and hard-to-raise yarn prices on the other.
From a regional perspective, chemical fiber clusters in Jiangsu and Zhejiang face greater cost pressure, while Xinjiang cotton regions benefit from high cotton prices, but downstream mill order recovery remains uncertain. Overall, raw material divergence is forcing companies across the chain to reassess their procurement pace and inventory strategies.