JinkoSolar Holding Co.Ltd., a global leader in the photovoltaic (PV) industry, recently announced its withdrawal from the European Union (“EU”) Price Undertaking (“UT”) agreement.
Under the terms of the UT agreement that JinkoSolar was party to, Chinese companies selling solar cells and solar panels in the EU must sell at a price above a fixed Minimum Import Price (“MIP”). Chinese solar manufacturers that did not accept the UT agreement faced anti-dumping (“AD”) and anti-subsidy (“AS”) duties, which forJinkoSolar were 41.2% and 6.5%, respectively. After careful strategic consideration, the Company believes that the UT agreement is no longer conducive to the ongoing expansion of its business in the EU. The Company believes that trade protectionism only harms fair competition in the market, hinders the development of the entire PV industry, and hurts PV consumers.
Mr. Xiande Li, Chairman of JinkoSolar, commented: “After carefully reviewing our EU operations, we believe that the current MIPs no longer accurately reflect the current market price environment given that average selling prices (“ASPs”) in all major EU markets continue to decline, and seriously erode our competitiveness in those markets. We feel our competitiveness and market power were being unfairly hampered and have opted to withdraw from the UT agreement. We believe that we will be in a better position to leverage our strong brand name, industry-leading technology, global production facilities, and large customer base once we withdraw from the UT agreement. We remain committed to our European customers and will continue to supply them with the high quality, reliable products we have become synonymous with.”
