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China’s mainstream TOPCon modules stayed flat for a second consecutive week, with trading activity remaining subdued before the Golden Week break, as market players hesitated to finalize deals given unclear price trends heading into the end of the year.
Per the OPIS Global Solar Markets Report issued Sept. 22, the Chinese Module Marker, OPIS’s benchmark for TOPCon modules under 645W from China, held at $0.108/W Free-On-Board China.
Offers from manufacturers continued to span a broad range, mirroring divergent views on pricing over the next several months. Industry participants also noted that ongoing supply of cheaper, lower-efficiency modules was dragging on the wider module market.
Sluggish domestic installations since January have added further pressure on module demand and pricing. China’s cumulative solar installations reached 97.19 GW across January-August, a drop of more than 57.9% versus the same period in 2025. August additions came to 11.04 GW, a 21.6% decline month-on-month.
According to some industry participants, soft domestic module demand has made local module prices more responsive to wider market swings, pushing manufacturers to prioritize overseas sales. Sources said this pivot may account for the comparative steadiness of export module prices.
From the beginning of August, domestic ex-works China mainstream TOPCon module prices climbed roughly 3.4%, whereas FOB China prices stayed level.
The forward curve has likewise softened in recent months. OPIS put FOB China TOPCon module prices for Q1 2027 loading at a $0.02/W discount to spot prices this week, versus a modest $0.01/W premium in late June.
In the U.S., imported module spot prices were unchanged as market participants kept evaluating the consequences of Section 232 minimum import prices, due to begin Dec. 4.
Delivered duty paid U.S. prices for TOPCon modules 645W and below stayed at $0.290/W, with Southeast Asian cargo quotes at $0.277/W and Indian cargo quotes at $0.332/W.
Prices for U.S.-assembled TOPCon modules using imported cells, delivered on a domestic DDP U.S. basis, gained 0.63% to $0.321/W.
The Section 232 proclamation issued in early August remained visible in the U.S. forward curve. DDP indications for TOPCon modules in the first two quarters of 2027 were assessed at $0.345/W, up from $0.29/W in July.
Supplier pricing after December was still unresolved, though, with a distributor noting the company had not yet obtained firm prices as suppliers waited to observe how rivals set their own prices.
Questions persisted over whether the proclamation’s first arms-length sale provision would bring U.S.-assembled modules that use imported cells under the $0.38/W module minimum import price. In OPIS’s Sept. 15 report, a source at a U.S. manufacturer raised doubts about whether U.S. Customs and Border Protection would accept imported-cell transactions priced at the $0.22/W cell minimum import price plus the 15% tariff. The source said that if such treatment were accepted, U.S.-assembled modules could be sold beneath the module minimum import price.
A policy source at a major supplier, by contrast, expected the new price controls to be enforced strictly and contended that workarounds would defeat the mandate’s purpose.
Opinions also diverged on whether enforcement would wipe out import demand. The distributor anticipated that import demand would vanish, reasoning that officials would push tariff rates higher still if the announced controls did not deter imports.
The policy source, on the other hand, maintained that imports could preserve some cost competitiveness even if U.S. assemblers sold modules built with imported cells at $0.38/W, pointing to thin assembly margins.
At present, an early-stage project developer said U.S. customers were still in touch with overseas suppliers and expected those conversations to carry on so long as import prices remained near U.S.-assembled levels.
Separate from trade policy, the developer anticipated the industry would pause for a period following the last safe-harbor push for investment tax credit eligibility, noting that developers had ceased offering new projects once they doubted they could finish them before eligibility lapsed.
OPIS supplies energy prices, news, data, and analysis covering gasoline, diesel, jet fuel, LPG/NGL, coal, metals, and chemicals, along with renewable fuels and environmental commodities. It bought pricing data assets from Singapore Solar Exchange in 2022 and currently publishes the OPIS APAC Solar Weekly Report.
Interactive table based on the Store Companies dataset for this report.
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