Five predictions for the 2026 North American wood products market

Fastmarkets

Feb 06

Key takeaways: Our 2026 North American lumber market outlook predicts that demand for wood products will stabilize, supported by falling interest rates and renewed home improvement activity. We ...

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One of the best stock trading platforms in Singapore.","ogImage":"https://c1.itigergrowtha.com/portal5/static/media/og-logo.be62fbe1.png","ogUrl":"https://www.itiger.com/news/2609550251"},"companyName":"Tiger Brokers"},"pageData":{"isMobile":false,"isTiger":false,"isTTM":true,"region":"SGP","license":"TBSG","edition":"fundamental"},"isCrawlerRequest":true,"__swrFallback__":{"@#url:\"https://stock-news.skytigris.cn/v3/news\",params:#id:\"2609550251\",edition:\"fundamental\",auth_exemption:1,,,undefined,":{"share":"https://ttm.financial/m/news/2609550251?lang=en_US&edition=fundamental","thumbnail":"","is_english":true,"pubTime":"2026-02-06 13:00","share_image_url":"https://static.laohu8.com/e9f99090a1c2ed51c021029395664489","id":"2609550251","market":"fut","top_or_hot":-1,"title":"Five predictions for the 2026 North American wood products market","media":"Fastmarkets","content":"<div>\n<p>Key takeaways:\n\nOur 2026 North American lumber market outlook predicts that demand for wood products will stabilize, supported by falling interest rates and renewed home improvement activity. \nWe ...</p>\n\n<a href=\"https://www.fastmarkets.com/insights/five-predictions-for-the-2026-north-american-wood-products-market/\">Source Link</a>\n\n</div>\n","source":"fastmarkets_highlight","html":"<!DOCTYPE html>\n<html>\n<head>\n<meta http-equiv=\"Content-Type\" content=\"text/html; 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overflow: hidden}\n.head .h-thumb { width: 30px; height: 30px; margin: 0; padding: 0; border-radius: 50%; float: left;}\n.head .h-content { margin: 0; padding: 0 0 0 9px; float: left;}\n.head .h-name {font-size: 13px; color: #eee; margin: 0;}\n.head .h-time {font-size: 11px; color: #7E829C; margin: 0;line-height: 11px;}\n.small {font-size: 12.5px; display: inline-block; transform: scale(0.9); -webkit-transform: scale(0.9); transform-origin: left; -webkit-transform-origin: left;}\n.smaller {font-size: 12.5px; display: inline-block; transform: scale(0.8); -webkit-transform: scale(0.8); transform-origin: left; -webkit-transform-origin: left;}\n.bt-text {font-size: 12px;margin: 1.5em 0 0 0}\n.bt-text p {margin: 0}\n</style>\n</head>\n<body>\n<div class=\"wrapper\">\n<header>\n<h2 class=\"title\">\nFive predictions for the 2026 North American wood products market\n</h2>\n\n<h4 class=\"meta\">\n\n\n2026-02-06 13:00 GMT+8&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;<a href=https://www.fastmarkets.com/insights/five-predictions-for-the-2026-north-american-wood-products-market/><strong>Fastmarkets</strong></a>\n\n\n</h4>\n\n</header>\n<article>\n<div>\n<p>Key takeaways:\n\nOur 2026 North American lumber market outlook predicts that demand for wood products will stabilize, supported by falling interest rates and renewed home improvement activity. \nWe ...</p>\n\n<a href=\"https://www.fastmarkets.com/insights/five-predictions-for-the-2026-north-american-wood-products-market/\">Source Link</a>\n\n</div>\n\n\n</article>\n</div>\n</body>\n</html>\n","isBrief":false,"type":0,"news_type":1,"symbol":"BK4117","symbol_name":"多元化保险","start_time":0,"source_url":"https://www.fastmarkets.com/insights/five-predictions-for-the-2026-north-american-wood-products-market/","article_id":"2609550251","we_media_id":null,"thumbnails":[],"rights":{"source":"fastmarkets_highlight","url":"https://www.fastmarkets.com/insights/five-predictions-for-the-2026-north-american-wood-products-market/","rn_cache_url":null,"directOrigin":true},"url":"https://stock-news.laohu8.com/highlight/detail?id=2609550251","pubTimestamp":1770354000,"columns":[],"sourceInfo":{"source_id":"fastmarkets_highlight","name":"Fastmarkets"},"weMediaInfo":null,"summary":"In 2026, the North American wood products industry enters a year of cautious stabilization.","collect":0,"end_time":0,"defaultTopTitle":"fastmarkets.com","property":[],"viewcount":null,"language":"en","relate_stocks":{"BK4117":"多元化保险","AFG":"美国金融集团有限公司","BK4107":"财产与意外伤害保险"},"translate_title":"2026年北美木制品市场五大预测","themeId":null,"isJumpTheme":false,"ttsUrl":null,"symbols_score_info":{"AFG":1.5},"content_text":"Key takeaways:\n\nOur 2026 North American lumber market outlook predicts that demand for wood products will stabilize, supported by falling interest rates and renewed home improvement activity. \nWe expect overall consumption for wood products in the North American market to remain flat.\nAccording to our North American lumber forecast, we expect softwood lumber capacity to decline by over 1.3 billion board feet (BBF) due to ongoing mill closures in British Columbia and the US South.\nMarket trends suggest that lumber duties may fall to 15-20%, while reduced Brazilian panel imports and continued tariffs are likely to drive modest price increases across most wood product categories.\n\nAnother challenging year is in the books for the North American wood products industry. To recap, demand disappointed as affordability challenges festered with inflation and interest rates remaining sticky. Compounding this, uncertainty surged with the onset of a trade war and a prolonged government shutdown. Mill asset closures continued in response to sustained weakness, though not at the same clip we saw in 2024. Confidence across the building materials and broader forest products complex is probably the lowest we have seen since the Global Financial Crisis.\nForecasting in this policy-driven environment has been challenging to say the least. And while the dust seems to be settling on many fronts, much remains in question given ongoing trade negotiations, elevated recession concerns, a push by the current administration to reignite home building, and pronounced pessimism in the lumber and panel markets.\nSo, what does our wood products team at Fastmarkets expect for the North American wood products market in 2026? Below are five key predictions that we believe will drive the market this year.\n1. Demand will stabilize across most wood products\nOne of our key forecast misses in last year’s “Predictions” piece was the call for a demand turnaround in North American wood products that did not materialize. While interest rates continued to fall as predicted and the US did avoid a recession despite much speculation, affordability challenges paired with the explosion of uncertainty due to the trade war amplified the drags on home buying and construction activity.\nThe good news is some of this trade related uncertainty should subside in 2026 as more trade deals are inked and the administration walks back some of the most onerous tariffs, as we saw on December 31 with the postponement of further increases on furniture, cabinets and vanities.\nInterest rates, while descending at a slower pace than we expected, should continue to fall as inflation cools and the Federal Reserve pivots further to address labor market uncertainty. The first half of the year should also get a fiscal boost from Congress passing the One Big Beautiful Bill (OBBB) last year as substantial tax refunds hit household bank accounts. Just recently, the White House also announced a plan to purchase mortgage back securities to help push mortgage rates lower. Other plans to support builders seem in the cards as well.\n\nResidential construction, which accounts for about 70-80% of wood products demand in North America, should see some modest, albeit unspectacular, improvements under these macroeconomic conditions. Even marginal improvements in affordability should at least help stabilize the crucial single-family market, which saw an estimated drop in starts of 8-10% last year. Although slowing off its current pace, we also anticipate more multifamily projects will pencil out as rates continue to ease and upzoning efforts in many jurisdictions across the country help drive more affordable housing construction.\nFinally, home improvement activity, which based on our Fastmarkets Repair & Remodeling Index has shown signs of reacceleration, should continue to gain momentum as real disposable income remains steady and drops in short-term interest rates stimulate more HELOCs to drive home improvement projects. Pent-up project demand is also substantial in the space, and should be unlocked by more certainty on inflation and the jobs front later this year.\nDemand will vary by product, but we expect wood products consumption in the US to remain flat in 2026, with structural panel markets performing the strongest, while nonstructural panels will experience greater weakness as those products are still feeling the downshift in home completions and domestic furniture and cabinet production. While downside risk to the outlook exists, Fastmarkets believes the significant losses from last year should pause again in 2026 as the wood products market transitions to a reacceleration phase later in the year that sets up solid growth in 2027. However, in the meantime, demand will still remain challenging as near-term headwinds continue to be pronounced.\n2. Softwood lumber capacity losses will accelerate to over 1 BBF\nShuttering of industry capacity has been an ongoing theme in the softwood lumber market for the past several years. Average annualized operable capacity in 2024 and our preliminary estimates for 2025 show a similar drop in operable capacity (-0.7 billion board feet (BBF)). While losses since 2017 have focused on the struggling British Columbia market, we have seen a pronounced surge in southern yellow pine (SYP) closures in the US South in response to weak market conditions and historic discounts for SYP compared with competing species.\nOf course, industry rationalization reflects a number of factors, including declining demand since 2021, compressed margins from prices correcting back to pre-pandemic levels for many key items and pronounced stress in Canada from longer-term structural fiber challenges in BC, steadily rising lumber duties on Canadian supply and now 10% tariffs stacked on top of that.\nOur forecast expects more of the same as asset closures continue to be announced and Canadian sawmills face pronounced financial stress with a combined 45% combined duties and tariffs. Fastmarkets is calling for North American average annual capacity to drop 1.3 BBF in 2026 as both SYP and spruce-pine-fir (SPF) supply face outright losses. The last time average annual operable capacity declined 1.0 BBF or more was in 2010 near the trough of the Global Financial Crisis. Capacity rationalization will continue to be a key driver rebalancing an oversupplied softwood lumber market.\n\n3. Lumber duties are set to fall to 15-20% after AR7\nObviously higher duties and tariffs remain a core theme driving wood product markets since the beginning of 2025. Record duties since the expiration of the last Softwood Lumber Agreement (SLA) continue to be a massive driver of the supply shifts we are seeing in the market. Most Canadian sawmills are cash negative, with FOB prices below $500 per thousand board feet (MBF), emphasizing how dire the situation is for lumber producers north of the border.\nWhile a slew of potential outcomes could be envisioned from ongoing trade negotiations, it seems unlikely a new SLA will materialize with upcoming United States Mexico Canada Agreement (USMCA) reviews this summer and the latest reescalation of trade disputes between the US and Canada. The immediate impacts are that we will probably see a new round of countervailing duties (CVDs) and antidumping duties (ADDs) implemented from the 7th Annual Review later this summer.\nWe will find out the preliminary duty levels from AR7 sometime in the first quarter, but our current analysis suggests ADDs, which are currently set at 20.5% for the average Canadian producer, could be cut in half. Dumping assessments should be less onerous because Canadian log costs declined during the 2024 reference period while lumber prices moved sideways. Forecasting CVDs is much more difficult given that tracking individual subsidy programs by company is challenging in real time, but assuming these are around 10% (the average of the last two CVD assessment periods), we believe the combined rate for the average Canadian producer will be 15-20% once finalized later this summer.\n\nHowever, while moving from a 34.2% duty to a 15-20% duty will be welcome relief for the Canadian industry, and unlock some curtailed supply on the margin in the second half of 2026, we still expect 10% Section 232 tariffs put in place in October to remain stacked on top of the duties, so Canadian producers will continue to face tremendous financial stress despite the major duty relief slated for this year. And the recent threats of 100% duties on Canada for its agreement in principle with China on electric vehicles and agricultural products serve as a reminder that risks to this part of the forecast remain pronounced.\n4. Panel imports from Brazil will fall substantially, providing price support for plywood and MDF\nWood panels were not included in the October Section 232 tariffs placed on dimensional lumber, logs and some value-added products such as kitchen cabinets. Therefore, wood panels are subject to country-specific reciprocal tariff rates. These are mostly relatively low tariff rates, but Brazil also has a separate 40% tariff rate stacked on top of the baseline 10% rate, bringing the total tariff rate for imports from Brazil to 50%. In the first 10 months of 2025, 48% of US plywood imports and 57% of US MDF imports were from Brazil. Brazilian imports equated to 11% of domestic plywood consumption and 37% of domestic MDF consumption during that time. Assuming these tariffs remain in place for a good part of 2026, we can anticipate that US imports from Brazil will be substantially lower this year than last year. Some of this will be offset by larger import volumes from elsewhere, but overall plywood and MDF imports will still decline, and a greater share of consumption will need to be supplied by US producers.\n\nBrazilian panels are unsurprisingly nearly all imported into US ports in the US South and US Northeast, so a decline in Brazilian panels will affect Southern plywood more than Western plywood. We expect ½-inch SYP 3-ply will maintain a premium over ½-inch fir 3-ply for most of 2026 for this reason. Demand on US mills will strengthen more than overall consumption in 2026 for both plywood and MDF, thanks to a decrease in imports.\nPlywood prices will have limited upside due to the large and growing OSB discount. Similarly, MDF prices may not increase at all despite this added supply pressure because of the fact that MDF prices are already elevated. We predict the wide spread between particleboard and MDF prices will remain intact due in part to this shifting supply picture.\nThis prediction may be the riskiest for the simple fact that trade policies can always change for one reason or another.\n5. Prices for most wood products will rise but will be held in check by underwhelming demand\nThe combination of capacity rationalization along with a modest demand rebound for most structural products should set the stage for average prices for most wood products to rise in 2026. Softwood lumber will likely experience the most volatility given the dramatically higher duties in place and the resulting supply adjustments we will continue to see in response.\nWe expect structural panel markets to face similar dynamics, albeit to a milder degree. OSB weakness will be more pronounced given its greater dependence on new construction than softwood lumber, but some of this will be cancelled out by tightness in the plywood market after a pullback in Brazilian supply facing 50% tariffs reduces some of the broader oversupply in the panel market.\n\nParticleboard and MDF prices will likely remain stable because even modest rebounds in new construction activity will take longer to feed into demand for these products as they fall later in the building cycle.\nAlthough pricing volatility should be held in check by what will still be fairly low industry operating rates, product markets could nevertheless be in for a few surprises given that the policy environment remains uncertain, especially with respect to Canadian and US trade relations. Buyers and sellers will price these risks into each product market as needed.\nStay ahead of market shifts and gain a competitive advantage with our trusted and transparent wood products market intelligence. Understand the “why” behind price movements to make more confident decisions for your business. Ready to see how our insights can benefit you? Speak to our team or download a sample of our North American lumber market outlook to learn more.\n\nDownload now","kind":"highlight","is_publish_news":true,"is_publish_highlight":false,"is_publish_live":false,"is_publish_wemedia":null,"editions":null,"column":"","sentiment":"0","news_tag":"","news_rank":0,"symbols":[],"gpt_button":0,"need_auth":false,"code":"91000000","status":"200"}}}