The Zhitong Finance App learned that Guoxin Securities released a research report saying that in 2026, second-generation refrigerant compliance will be cut, the third-generation refrigerant quota system will continue, and the concentration of industries such as R32, R134a, and R125 is high; the conversion ratio between third-generation refrigerant types has increased year-on-year, and the flexibility of enterprise production and deployment has increased. It is expected that mainstream third-generation refrigerants will maintain a tight balance between supply and demand in 2026. The bank believes that the tightening of refrigerant quota restrictions is a long-term trend. In this context, the bank is optimistic that mainstream refrigerant boom such as R32, R134a, and R125 will continue, and there is still plenty of room for price growth in the long term; leading companies with corresponding refrigerant quotas are expected to maintain a high level of long-term profitability. Furthermore, I am optimistic about the increase in demand for fluorine-containing electronic materials in the pan-semiconductor sector. It is recommended to focus on increasing the volume and price of products such as electronic grade PTFE, ultra-pure PFA, electronic grade hydrofluoric acid, fluorinated electronic gas, and fluorinated liquid.
Guoxin Securities's main views are as follows:
Review of fluorine chemical market in July
As of the end of July (July 31), the Shanghai Composite Index reported 3,832 points, down 6.40% from the end of June; the Shanghai and Shenzhen 300 Index reported 4,589 points, down 7.86% from the end of June; the Shenwan Chemical Index reported 4113, down 13.70% from the end of June; and the Fluorine Chemical Index reported 1,925 points, down 16.62% from the end of June. In July, the Fluorine Chemical Industry Index outperformed the Shenwan Chemical Index by 2.92 pcts, outperformed the Shanghai and Shenzhen 300 Index by 8.76 pcts, and outperformed the Shanghai Composite Index by 10.21 pcts. According to the Guoxin Chemical Price Index compiled by the bank, as of July 31, 2026, Guoxin Chemical's Fluorine Chemical Price Index and Guoxin Chemical's Refrigerant Price Index reported 1415.9 and 2155.3 points respectively, which were +0.76% and +0.29% respectively at the end of June. PVDF and PTFE showed varying degrees of decline in July, and some refrigerants such as R22, R134a, and R32, and fluorite all rose to varying degrees.
Prices of mainstream refrigerants such as R22, R32, R134a, and R410a continue to rise
According to Fluorine Online and Zhuochuang information, as of August 3, 2026, the price of R22 remained between 24,000 and 25,000 yuan/ton. The price of R32 increased to 6.45-65,500 yuan/ton. At the end of June, domestic refrigerant companies quoted R32 cash exchange of 6.51 yuan/ton, accepting 6.56 yuan/ton, up 2,900 yuan/ton from the second quarter; R410a/R404/R507 remained at 6.0/5.35/53,500 yuan, of which R410a had a current exchange rate of 60,000 yuan/ton for the third quarter. The price of R134a remained at 64-65,000 yuan/ton.
Britain and the US adjust the pace of elimination of third-generation refrigerants, which is beneficial to the increase in the volume and price of China's refrigerant exports
According to Fluorine Online, the UK recently postponed a “stricter” HFCs elimination plan, and the UK's largest refrigerant wholesaler raised prices for products such as R410a and R407c. The US Environmental Protection Agency officially finalized the revisions to the “2023 Technology Transformation Rules” on May 21, extending the compliance period of use of HFC refrigerants, easing related usage restrictions, and allowing companies to choose more cost-effective refrigerant products. The recent adjustments in the UK and the US to the pace of elimination of third-generation refrigerants are not a denial of the “Kigali Amendment”, but rather an amendment to the domestic reinforcement policy that was ahead of schedule and too steep in the past few years. The core meaning is that third-generation refrigerants have not deviated from the general direction of long-term restrictions, but their actual service life and maintenance and replacement cycle in developed countries have been lengthened, and the downward slope in demand in the short to medium term has clearly slowed down. As a major global supplier of refrigerants, China has increased certainty in exports, inventory replenishment, and bargaining.
Hot weather in Europe drives up demand for air conditioning segments
Production schedules diverged from January to February 2026 due to the Spring Festival holiday. Domestic sales and production schedules for household air conditioners from March to April showed strong resilience. Demand for supporting installation driven by Baojiao Building was still supported by industry fundamentals. There was only a slight year-on-year decline against the backdrop of a high base and continuous rise in superimposed raw material costs last year. The production schedule for air conditioning in May was lowered under pressure from various sources such as costs and inventory; in June, driven by the “618” consumer festival, terminal sales improved compared to expectations, but there was still a big gap compared to the same period; there was a slight increase in the July production schedule, mainly due to the need for some brands to replenish stocks. In August, some compressor and air conditioning companies will soon begin equipment maintenance and factory vacations, and the production schedule will decline slightly.
In terms of exports, according to customs data, China exported a total of 39.14 million air conditioners from January to June 2026, or -4.7% compared with the same period last year. The export market has shown a downward trend since May 2025. The high base for the same period last year was compounded by inventory pressure brought about by early export preemption, leading to a year-on-year decline for 8 consecutive months. After the peak overseas Christmas season at the end of the year, it entered a regular replenishment cycle. January-February 2026 was affected by the domestic Spring Festival. The impact of the March Spring Festival holiday faded away, and the decline in export production narrowed rapidly. However, due to the formation of a high base in 2025, combined with the impact of the Middle East War on transportation costs, export schedules still declined year-on-year in March-June. However, hot weather in the European market has also activated segmented demand, driving mobile air conditioners to buck the trend. The decline in export schedules narrowed in August, and orders from Latin America, North America, and the Middle East gradually showed signs of recovery.
In terms of domestic sales schedule, according to Industry Online, 5.87 million units were scheduled to be produced in August 2026, or -24.1% year-on-year; in terms of export production, the export schedule for August 2026 was 4.86 million units, -8.1% year over year.
Focus on the rapid growth in demand for fluorine-containing electronic materials under this round of AI catalysis
High-end fluoropolymer, (1) PTFE: Nvidia initiated Rubin Ultra's M10 CCL material testing. The AI server carried massive computational power signal transmission. The M10 system upgrade placed higher demands on the material's dielectric constant and dielectric loss. With a dielectric constant as low as 2.0-2.1 and dielectric loss as low as 10-4-10-5, PTFE has excellent dielectric performance advantages in high-frequency millimeter wave scenarios, making it one of the alternative resin solutions for the M10 system. (2) PFA: High-purity PFA has been monopolized overseas for a long time and is widely used in key processes such as semiconductor wafer cleaning, etching pipelines, and high-purity reagent delivery. At the beginning of May, the first batch of qualified ultra-pure PFA products of Jusheng Fluorine Chemical, a subsidiary of Juhua Co., Ltd. successfully completed the first order delivery and was officially launched on the market. Furthermore, Shaowuyong and the high-purity PFA project entered the trial production stage in October 2025, and related process verification and performance optimization work is progressing in an orderly manner. Electronic grade hydrofluoric acid. Anhydrous hydrofluoric acid is the main raw material for the production of electronic grade hydrofluoric acid. The Middle East war affected the shortage of sulfur as a raw material for hydrofluoric acid. According to a report by Taiwan's Economic Daily on July 1, there are reports in the industry that TSMC, Samsung, and SK Hynix are all snapping up electronic-grade hydrofluoric acid. Rising raw material prices are driving up the cost of electronic-grade hydrofluoric acid. Some suppliers have increased their sales prices one after another, by about 20 to 30 percent. Furthermore, BOE is a buffered oxide etching solution, which is a mixture of hydrofluoric acid and ammonium fluoride, making it more stable and controllable during the etching process. With fluoride gas, South Korea's Samsung Electronics and SK Hynix have entered a new round of large capital expenditure, which is beneficial to the growth in demand for upstream electronic materials. Furthermore, due to the increase in gas consumption per wafer due to the increase in gas consumption per wafer due to computing power chips, HBM, 3DNAND advanced nodes, and multi-layer stacking, the increase in demand for electronic gas will have a multiplier effect of increasing gas consumption per unit of wafer production expansion. Fluorine-containing gases such as hexafluorobutadiene can improve etching accuracy and efficiency, and are required for advanced storage etching; tungsten hexafluoride can be used in advanced logic, DRAM, and 3DNAND vapor phase deposition tungsten conductor films. Fluorine-containing coolants. With the development of AI technology, server power density has increased dramatically, and traditional air cooling methods have reached a bottleneck. Liquid cooling technology can effectively reduce data center PUE. Among them, immersion and dual-phase plate liquid cooling have become future trends, driving rapid growth in demand for upstream fluorinated liquids and refrigerants.
This month's fluorine chemical highlights
The trial production of the Gansu Juhua Silicon Fluoride Project passed the review; Yonghe Co., Ltd. achieved net profit of 513 million yuan in the first half of 2026, an increase of 89.01% over the previous year; Sanmei Co., Ltd. lays out wet electronic chemicals; and Juhua Co., Ltd. mass-produced high-purity PFA to boost the high-end semiconductor market.
Risk warning: demand for fluorine chemical products falls short of expectations; policy risks (stricter environmental protection policies for fluorine refrigerants, accelerated upgrading process, changes in quota issuance policies, etc.); global trade frictions and export blockages; sluggish real estate cycle prosperity; production progress of various companies' projects falls short of expectations; rising raw material prices; chemical production safety risks, etc.