Germany, China, and Italy are among the main exporters of enamelled wire in the world. On the other hand, with the exports reduction over the recent years, the US has started to import higher volume and hit a peak compared to other countries in 2021, which could be due to its growing demand.
Enamelled wire has been traded in an average of 698kt globally from 2011 to 2021, and its trade volume in 2021 was 15% less compared to 2011, with a downward trend. The trade trend of countries indicates that China and Spain are trying to increase their export volume over the past years, and try to take over the import market of their neighboring countries.
Enamelled wire is a type of copper wire that is coated with special resins with relatively high heat resistance and is made with different diameters. Enamelled wires are produced with different thermal classes based on the application type, and a special insulator is consumed to produce each type of these wires. The thermal class indicates the maximum temperature tolerance of the product. These wires are used to produce induction coils of transformers, electric motors, generators, and other things. Today, it is rare to find an industrial product that does not contain traces of enamelled wire. Therefore, from the smallest household appliances to the most complex industrial tools and equipment, they have an inevitable and extensive dependence on enamelled wire.
Top five global exporters with 46% share
The trade of enamelled wire has had continuous changes over the timeframe and has gone through a downward trend, decrease from around 772kt in 2011 to about 656kt in 2021. The trade of enamelled wire declined by 9% between 2019 and 2020, which fell from 644kt in 2019 to 588kt in 2020, but it increased 11% in 2021, according to the figure 1.
This product has been traded in an average of 698kt over the past years, which according to the average demand of copper wire and cable in the world, which was 16Mt (copper content), it can be acknowledged that the trade of enamelled wire has provided about 4.5% of the products’ demand.
Germany, China, Italy, Spain, and the US are among the main exporters of enamelled wire in the world, which accounted for trade share of 46% on average. The US, Italy, and Germany had a total share of 32% of the total exports volume. The US exports showed a 42% y/y drop in 2012, down from around 87kt in 2011 to about 50kt in 2012, since then, it indicated a continuous downward trend and reached 42kt by 2021.
Germany has always had the largest share in the trade of enamelled wire and has a total global share of 12% on average. The country’s export was about 77kt from 2011, which hit a peak of around 101kt in 2017, accounted for 14% of the total global trade. Germany’s export trend was down warded again from 2018 to 2020 and finally reached 83kt in 2021 with a growth of 6%.
While the global trend of enamelled wire trade has been alternately down warded in the last decade, after a sharp growth in 2012 compared to the previous year, China and Spain have always tried to increase their exports. Spain increased its export volume from around 27kt to about 51kt in 2012, with a 91% y/y hike, and after that, it always increased its export volume until 2021 with an upward trend and reached about 61kt. It is worth mentioning that, the country’s main export has been to its European neighbors, especially the Czech Republic and France, and it has taken a major part of the import market of these two countries.
China’s export of enamelled wire was up warded between 2011 and 2018, increased from about 51kt in 2011 to 73kt thousand tons in 2018, then, it experienced a drop of 7% and 8% in 2019 and 2020, respectively, due to the pandemic. But the country’s export volume reached 74kt, up with 18% in 2021, and was able to obtain 11% of the total trade. Moreover, China take over the monopoly of the East Asian market. East Asian industrial countries such as Japan and Taiwan, which are manufacturers of motors and electronic devices, are among the main buyers of the country’s enamelled wire.
Largest number of importers in the global trade
Most countries are present in the product import, due to its scattered consumption market. However, Germany, the US, the Czech Republic, China, and France were among the major global importers of enamelled wire, which had a cumulative trade share of 30%, as in Figure 2. Germany, the US, and China, which were the main exporters of enamelled wire, are also the product’s importer.
The US has increased its imports with a downward trend from about 47kt since 2011to 41kt in 2016, but then, with a 12% y/y surge in 2017, it increased the import volume to around 47kt. Then the imports volume reached 53kt in 2021, up by 20% y/y. Consequently, with a share of 8% of the total global trade in 2021, the US took the largest imports share among other countries. After losing its position in the export of enamelled wire, the US is trying to grow the import volume over the recent years, put it another way, the domestic demand for enamelled wire was predicted to increase over the recent years, according to the country’s trade trend.
Enamelled wire outlook
The investigation of demand for copper wires and cables indicates that until 2021, the demand for enamelled wires has increased annually according to Figure 3, but this amount decreased by 4% from 2019 to 2020, which the pandemic can be one of the main reasons. The trade volume of enamelled wire compared to the total global demand over the past 10 years, has also experienced a downward trend especially from 2018 to 2021, which indicates the formation of new production capacities in new locations.
Nowadays, due to the electrification of many equipment, the use of electric auxiliary systems such as electric window lifts and electric seat adjustment in cars, which generally need electric motors for their operation, the demand for enamelled wire has increased, and this trend is expected to grow more over the coming years even with the entry and development of the electric auto market. The product trade is expected to grow in line with the global demand growth, due to the continuous economic growth that causes the expansion of the industry and the demand for consumer goods, similar to the demand market for enamelled wire over the coming years. Finally, it will lead to a constant share of trade in providing global demand.