A summary of China’s butyl rubber imports and exports in September 2026. Based on the full customs declaration records under HS codes 40023110 / 40023190 / 40023910 / 40023990 — 211 records, 29,277 tonnes — it reviews scale and structure, partner concentration, trade modes and price stratification.
Looked at through net imports alone, the month is almost balanced: net imports of just 2,481 tonnes and USD 6.56 million, less than 16% of imports. Unpack the structure, though, and China is a high-volume two-way hub: 15,879 tonnes imported and 13,398 tonnes exported, 29,277 tonnes in total, 11.8 times the net balance. Measuring China’s external dependence on butyl rubber by the net import gap systematically understates the real volume of cargo moving through the country; for purchasing and sales decisions, what matters is the two-source concentration risk on the import side and the customer-following structure on the export side.
01Two-way hub: halogenated butyl has almost levelled out
The two product groups behave quite differently. Regular butyl imported 3,848 tonnes and exported 2,328 tonnes, a net import of 1,521 tonnes; exports are only 60% of imports, the classic profile of a structural demand gap. Halogenated butyl imported 12,030 tonnes and exported 11,070 tonnes, a net import of only 960 tonnes and an export-to-import ratio of 92%, close to balanced two-way trade; processing and re-export characteristics are clearly stronger than pure consumption.
Channel structure confirms it: 48.1% of imports and 22.5% of exports moved through bonded and customs-supervised channels, and for Russian cargo the bonded share reached 84%. Much of the flow happens outside the customs territory or inside bonded operations, which is exactly why “net imports of 2,481 tonnes” both understates two-way volume and obscures structural dependence.
02Imports: two dominant sources, Saudi Arabia buying share with price
Of 14 origins, Russia (36.2%), Saudi Arabia (35.4%) and Singapore (19.3%) together account for 91.0% of import value, with an HHI of 2,968, far above the highly concentrated threshold. Russia’s 5,454 tonnes and Saudi Arabia’s 6,129 tonnes make up 71.6% of import value between them; any logistics or policy disruption at either source could not be covered by other origins in the short term. Of Singapore’s 2,942 tonnes, 1,900 tonnes is regular butyl, which makes Singapore more a regional trading and allocation centre than an origin.
Within halogenated butyl, Saudi landed prices average USD 2.823/kg, 14.1% below Russia’s USD 3.286/kg, and the volume comes with it. This is the month’s most important competitive signal: if the spread persists, the benchmark for Russian term contracts will be dragged down systematically, and Saudi cargo can serve as a usable price anchor. Whether the lower price corresponds to prime material suitable for tire inner liners must be verified against specifications and small-lot trials; average price alone cannot establish substitutability.
Channel differences also set the operating rhythm: 84% of Russian cargo moves through bonded channels, stored in bonded warehouses and declared in batches as needed, so spot availability is better; Saudi cargo is weighted more toward ordinary trade, closer to point-to-point term supply — better on price, but volumes must be committed earlier.
03Exports: following customers overseas, fragmented but without pricing power
Exports go to 45 destinations with an HHI of only 1,421; the top three — Vietnam (29.7%), Thailand (15.5%) and South Korea (12.2%) — total 57.5%, in sharp contrast with 91.0% on the import side. China buys from few, sells to many, and the direction of bargaining power is clear: passive on the import side, flexible but without market leadership on the export side.
Vietnam, Thailand, Cambodia and Indonesia, together with Serbia, Poland and Mexico, overlap closely with where Chinese tire makers have built plants abroad in recent years. We therefore infer that export growth comes mainly from raw material demand at those overseas bases rather than from natural expansion in overseas end markets. This is a medium-strength inference based on geographic coincidence: customs records do not identify the final buyer, so re-exports and purchases by non-Chinese local plants cannot be excluded, and the consignor lists would be needed to cross-check.
Price stratification is equally clear: Vietnam at 3.591, Cambodia at 3.702, Taiwan, China at 3.741 and South Korea at 3.305 USD/kg form the high band; Thailand at 2.698, Japan at 2.494 and Poland at 2.35 USD/kg form the low band, a gap of nearly 60%. Thailand’s large volume at low price needs checking for intra-group transfer pricing before being used as an external quotation reference. By province, exports concentrate in Shandong (39.8%), Zhejiang (38.7%) and Shanghai (15.2%); Zhejiang’s 5,637 tonnes average 2.904 while Shandong’s 5,029 tonnes average 3.351, a difference of about 13% — two distinct models, one competing on volume and one on price.
04The price inversion: not stronger competitiveness, but a coding mismatch
Export prices averaged USD 3.158/kg against USD 3.078/kg for imports, a spread of +0.080 USD/kg (+2.6%) — the reverse of the usual assumption that imports are high-end and exports low-end. The reason lies in the commodity code structure: on the import side, “other halogenated butyl” (40023990) reached 6,492 tonnes, 39.4% of imports, at an average of only 2.965; on the export side, halogenated butyl was almost entirely primary forms (40023910, 11,019 tonnes).
Using the report’s counterfactual, if the low-priced “other” volume were valued at 3.117 as primary-form halogenated butyl, monthly import value would rise by about USD 990,000, the average import price would climb to 3.140, and the import-export spread would narrow to roughly +0.6%, effectively disappearing. The positive spread therefore stems from a coding mismatch — low-grade in, prime material out — and does not indicate stronger export pricing power. The higher the share of low-priced imports, the more it suggests that import substitution is happening at the low end while prime high-end material still depends on imports.
05Link to our own product range
Butyl rubber and halogenated butyl rubber are among our main product families, predominantly Exxon premium grades. Our logistics network includes Saudi Arabia, Singapore and Japan among its origins, and China, Thailand, Vietnam and Cambodia among its customer markets — closely overlapping the main sources and export destinations the report identifies. The two-source concentration, the share of bonded channels and the export price stratification can all serve as industry reference points for purchasing rhythm and customer quotations. Note that the report is industry-level statistics: it contains no company, contract or grade fields, does not correspond to our specific business, and does not constitute any quotation basis.