As of late May 2026, the price of tungsten powder has dropped nearly 40% from its historical high in mid March (about 2.4 million yuan/ton), to around 1.45 million yuan/ton. This round of correction is a technical adjustment after the previous surge. In the short term, the downward trend has not completely ended, but the long-term bottom support remains strong.
1. Short term: weak volatility continues, easy to fall but difficult to rise
1.1 The selling pressure has not been cleared yet
Due to the pressure of capital turnover and the willingness to take profits, the holders are still actively releasing inventory, and the market circulation of goods is relatively abundant. Although panic selling has eased to some extent, it will take time for social inventory to be digested.
1.2 Downstream procurement willingness is sluggish
Affected by the mentality of “buying up, not buying down”, downstream end users generally hold bearish expectations, and purchase orders are significantly delayed or reduced, only maintaining essential inventory replenishment. Downstream enterprises have longer inventory cycles, making it difficult for high priced raw materials to be transmitted downstream.
1.3 Export control leads to increased pressure on domestic sales
Affected by export control policies, the export volume of tungsten products from January to March 2026 decreased by 50.93% year-on-year, and some tungsten products originally planned for export returned to China, exacerbating supply pressure.
2. Mid term: Pay attention to two major signals to stop the decline
2.1 Traders sell off
Panic selling ends, social inventory returns to normal levels
2.2 Downstream replenishment restart
After the price fell to the downstream psychological level, end customers began to replenish their essential inventory, resulting in increased transaction volume.
3. Long term: Strong bottom support, difficult to return to the low level of 2025
3.1 Supply constraints are the core support
The total control indicators for tungsten mining in China continue to tighten, and environmental supervision is normalized.
High grade resources are increasingly depleted, and mining costs continue to rise.
The exploration and production cycle of new mines is as long as 5-8 years, and effective increment cannot be formed in the short term.
The production of tungsten concentrate in April decreased by 11.88% month on month, and the cumulative production decreased by 8.19% year-on-year.
3.2 Long term positive demand
The trend of photovoltaic tungsten wire replacing traditional carbon steel wire is irreversible, and the penetration rate is expected to exceed 80% by 2026.
The demand in military, aerospace, electronic information and other fields is steadily increasing.
The global tungsten supply and demand gap is expected to continue to exist.