Wood fibreboard market in Germany has leveled out

From the beginning of November 2016, the market of MDF/HDF boards in Germany has been declining. The manufacturers could not reach the sales level, thus, profitability they enjoyed in the middle of 2016 even though there was quite strong demand for some of the products lines. Right in the beginning of the year after the season holidays Germany was hit with record low temperatures coupled with the traditional low volumes of construction and, on top of this, increase in the cost of raw materials together with the drop in prices for finished products, saw the manufacturers of wooden fiberboards incur significant financial losses which led in some cases for the manufacturers in the beginning of 2017 to cut production by lowering the man-hours worked.
In March 2017 the situation has brightened up a bit, according to the manufacturers, the prices have reached the rock bottom level and there is absolutely no room to go dawn more. Traders while negotiating the price levels for shipments in the second quarter of the year expressed readiness to pay from 5 to 10 euros more per cubic meter for the products of HDF line. As to the MDF line of products, traders do not see any preconditions for the prices to go up as the manufacturers are well stocked with raw materials, there are no shortages in the variety of products, the market is not booming, therefore no price hikes are expected in the close vicinity.
The beginning of March prices for HDF/MDF boards are on the same level as for the beginning of February 2017 and are: MDF, 16-19 mm – Euro 200-210/ m3; HDF, 16-19 mm – Euro 192-210/ m3.