Natural rubber "insurance+futures", listen to what upstream and downstream say.

Natural rubber is a worldwide industrial raw material with dual characteristics of industrial products and agricultural products. Because it is easily influenced by weather and human factors, its price fluctuates violently. The emergence of "insurance+futures" provides a new tool for the development of natural rubber industry to avoid price risks. However, in a recent interview, the reporter found that as a financial tool for hedging, the attitudes of upstream and downstream are quite different.

The producer said: rubber farmers eat "reassuring pills"

At present, the comprehensive cost of natural rubber in China is relatively high. In addition to the most basic direct costs such as raw materials and services, it also includes indirect costs such as social expenses, which is at a disadvantage compared with the international market. At the same time, affected by seasonal change and climate change, in case of extreme weather, the supply of natural rubber cannot be adjusted in a short time. In addition, natural rubber is an important military material, which has a keen and even strong reaction to the occurrence of major political events. Therefore, the price fluctuation of natural rubber products is more intense, and the market change cycle is longer.

He Jun, deputy general manager of Shanghai Futures Exchange, said that in recent years, the price fluctuation of natural rubber has affected the income of rubber farmers, and even there has been a phenomenon of "abandonment". "Insurance+futures" helps rubber farmers avoid the risks encountered in production, which can not only "cover the bottom" for rubber farmers, but also ensure their income, which is equivalent to giving natural rubber producers a "reassurance".

He mentioned that the first batch of compensation for the "insurance+futures" precision poverty alleviation pilot project of Natural Rubber was recently completed in Yunnan, with a total compensation of 5.038 million yuan, benefiting 462 rubber farmers, and the social effect was quite good.

There are unlimited opportunities in the hedging market, traders said.

The emergence of natural rubber futures not only provides hedging function for natural rubber producers, operators and consumers, but also provides more profit opportunities for middlemen and futures investors.

Lu Feng, deputy general manager of Shanghai International Energy Trading Center, said that natural rubber is a good futures product. Natural rubber is a kind of world commodity, which has a wide range of uses, large production capacity, small monopoly and a large number of buyers and sellers. As a natural polymer compound, natural rubber has stable quality, clear classification of specifications and grades, and is easy to standardize. Natural rubber is a kind of solid particle or flake, which is easy to store and transport, and meets the basic requirements of physical delivery of futures ... all these provide convenient conditions for natural rubber to become an ideal futures product.

Lu Feng mentioned that the spot market and futures market of natural rubber at home and abroad complement each other and form a relatively stable price relationship. This not only provides a good hedging market for the production, trade and consumption enterprises of various natural rubber varieties, but also provides an effective price reference for various participants in the natural rubber market at home and abroad. In addition, with the emergence of futures, the natural rubber market is gradually developing in the direction of spot price trading and basis trading based on futures prices. The international influence of natural rubber futures in China is also increasingly apparent. By expanding the liquidity and market capacity of the futures market, it indirectly provides a hedging market for natural rubber participants all over the world.

Users said: resolutely oppose futures speculation.

Tire is the largest downstream user of natural rubber, which is different from the attitude of upstream manufacturers and middlemen. Most tire companies are not "cold" about the "insurance+futures" model of natural rubber.

"Rubber farmers' futures+insurance policy can't help tire companies. On the contrary, the hype of natural rubber futures has a great impact on tire companies. " Shen, chairman of Zhongce Rubber, said that compared with other commodity futures, the natural rubber futures market has a small disk, few deliverable varieties and is easily controlled by funds, which is also the reason why the price fluctuation of natural rubber is much greater than the output in recent two years. At present, the natural rubber futures market in China is irrational and almost completely out of touch with the changes in the spot market. But at the same time, the huge price shock in the futures market leads the price change in the spot market, losing the role of the price discovery mechanism and hedging mechanism in the futures market. This is also the reason why China tire enterprises seldom set foot in the natural rubber futures market. The negative impact of the overall benefit of China tire enterprises this year has an important relationship with this.

Pu Yifu, chief commercial officer of Pirelli Industrial Tire Asia Pacific, believes that the most important consideration for enterprises should be how to quickly adapt to the changes in natural rubber prices. "In the first half of this year, the price of natural rubber experienced a sharp rise, a sharp drop and a sharp rise again. In order to adapt to this drastic change, downstream enterprises should adjust their own price policies and adjust the price of tire products according to the price of raw materials. This should be the most important way to deal with changes in raw material prices at present. " Pu Yifu said.

As a producer of primary rubber raw materials and terminal rubber products, Shidong Rubber is also not optimistic about the "futures+insurance" model. Li Shiqiang, general manager of the company, said that the main purpose of the "futures+insurance" mechanism introduced by the state and local governments is to ensure the interests of rubber farmers when the price of natural rubber falls sharply, and to subsidize rubber farmers to a certain extent in the form of insurance. However, this mechanism cannot solve the problem of sharp price fluctuation faced by rubber product manufacturers and large natural rubber suppliers. In the current natural rubber market, tire enterprises are very passive, they can't make a normal purchasing budget, and the purchasing behavior of raw materials is basically in a state of "gambling".

In addition, Shen also pointed out that the rules of the natural rubber futures market in China need to be reformed to some extent, so that the futures market cannot be turned into a "casino", and the huge influence of hot money in the futures market can be avoided, so that the rules of the futures market can truly adapt to the actual situation of the natural rubber market. Only in this way can the downstream enterprises of natural rubber really participate and the futures market play its due role.