Since the escalation of the US-Iran-Israel regional conflict in early March 2026, the global polyurethane raw material market has undergone a continuous and obvious price reshuffle. Turmoil in the Middle East, the core crude oil and chemical export hub, has disturbed raw material transportation, regional production arrangements and global supply chains, bringing sustained volatility to flexible foam polyether polyol and TDI markets, which are core raw materials for automotive foam, industrial sponge and daily PU products.
In the early stage of the conflict (March 2026), market sentiment was the main driving factor for price fluctuations. Affected by the tense situation in the Strait of Hormuz, international crude oil prices rose rapidly, pushing up the cost of basic chemical intermediates. At that time, domestic flexible polyether polyol prices started a continuous upward trend, while TDI market remained relatively stable in the short term due to sufficient domestic inventory, with only a small increase in mainstream offer prices. Most downstream manufacturers maintained rigid demand procurement and adopted wait-and-see attitudes to avoid overstocking.
Entering April 2026, the market trend changed significantly with the suspension of major Middle Eastern chemical plants. Large-scale local TDI and supporting intermediate production devices were forced to shut down due to regional security risks and supply chain disruption, resulting in a huge supply gap in the global TDI market. The overseas TDI export price jumped from USD 1900/ton in early March to a peak of USD 3000/ton, and the domestic market price also increased sharply from 15000–15500 RMB/ton to 20000 RMB/ton in a short period. Driven by the sharp rise of downstream TDI and upstream crude oil costs, flexible foam polyether polyol prices also rose steadily, completely reversing the previous weak market trend.
From May to July 2026, with the gradual easing of extreme conflict tensions and the partial resumption of production and logistics in the Middle East chemical zone, the overall raw material market entered a high-level shock stage rather than a sharp decline. The global TDI supply gap has been partially filled by Chinese manufacturers' export capacity, so the market price has dropped slightly but still remained much higher than the beginning of the year. Meanwhile, the price of flexible polyether polyol has stabilized synchronously, with no sharp fluctuations, supported by stable downstream demand for automotive interior foam, industrial cushioning foam and packaging foam.
Industry analysts pointed out that this round of PU raw material price fluctuations is a typical supply-side driven market change. Different from previous periodic inventory fluctuations, regional geopolitical risks have changed the short-term global supply pattern of TDI and polyether raw materials. At present, downstream end customers are more inclined to choose manufacturers with stable raw material channels and large-scale stock deployment capabilities to avoid production shutdown risks caused by frequent raw material price swings and supply shortages.
As a professional manufacturer deeply engaged in PU foam products and raw material matching, we have maintained long-term stable cooperation with high-quality raw material suppliers. Through reasonable raw material reserve and dynamic formula adjustment, we effectively hedge the impact of short-term raw material price fluctuations, ensuring stable product quality and competitive factory prices for automotive seat foam and various industrial flexible foam products, and providing continuous and reliable supply guarantee for global downstream customers.