Market expectations that LCD TV panel prices will stop falling in the first quarter have failed. The LCD TV panel price indicator report recently released by the market research agency shows that in March, except for the 32-inch panel, which stopped falling for two consecutive months, the prices of other sizes of panels continued to decline. What is even more pessimistic is that the agency expects that in April, the price of 32-inch panels will drop, while the price of large-size panels will still drop significantly.

Expectations of a stop to fall in the first quarter were met with disappointment

Prices of LCD TV panels of various sizes fell differently. In terms of small size, Ovi Ruiwo said that the price of 32-inch panels was flat month-on-month in March, but it is expected to drop by $1/piece in April due to the overall panel cut orders.

Panels are a typical cyclical industry. After about three years of supply and demand adjustments and superimposed epidemic factors, LCD TV panels have ushered in the longest round of "price increases" in history since the second quarter of 2020. However, starting from August 2021, terminal demand has reached saturation, and the panel industry's prosperity has turned downward and has continued to this day. The market generally expected that the decline in the first quarter of this year would stop falling, but after all, it failed to do so.

Korean factory or restart shutdown plan

At present, the prices of some LCD TV panels have halved from last year's highs, and some product lines have suffered losses. Industry insiders believe that under the heavy pressure, the two major panel factories in South Korea may put the production shutdown plan on the agenda again.

With the strong rise of domestic panel manufacturers such as BOE and TCL Huaxing, the competition in the LCD industry is very fierce. In recent years, Samsung Display has successively shut down its LCD production lines and turned to display technologies such as OLED and QLED. Samsung Display originally planned to shut down all LCD production lines by the end of 2020, but in order to ensure a sufficient supply of panels under the epidemic and due to the sharp rise in panel prices, it delayed the shutdown plan.

The same is true for LG Display, a major Korean panel maker. The company originally planned to stop production of domestic LCD TV panels in South Korea by the end of 2020, but it is still operating today.