Great Wall Securities: The underlying supply-and-demand structure is changing, and fiber optic cables are seeing a reassessment of their value

Great Wall Securities released a research report stating that between November 2025 and January 2026, the price of China’s G.562.D bare optical fiber rose by more than 80%, pushing China’s prices to exceed Europe and India. For the first time in more than seven years, China’s prices surpassed Europe’s level. The market’s underlying supply-and-demand fundamentals are undergoing changes. With the explosive growth in demand for AI computing power driving continued improvement in both the internal and external interconnection transmission performance and demand of data centers, demand in the optical fiber and cable market is also being lifted. However, due to capacity tightening during the industry downturn in the earlier period and the exit of small and medium-sized enterprises, the optical fiber and cable market is now concentrating on global leading enterprises, and manufacturers that possess full-industry-chain manufacturing capabilities for rod-and-fiber cables will benefit even more.

The main viewpoints of Great Wall Securities are as follows:

Upgrading of hollow-core/multicore optical fibers continues, creating new opportunities for optical fiber and cable under the evolution of optical interconnect technology

According to CRU data, optical fiber prices have surged significantly alongside sustained demand growth. Between November 2025 and January 2026, the price of China’s G.562.D bare optical fiber increased by more than 80%, pushing China’s prices to surpass those of Europe and India. This marks the first time in more than seven years that China’s prices have exceeded Europe’s level. The underlying supply-and-demand structure of the optical fiber and cable market is changing, as tight upstream supply and continued infrastructure investment are overlapping.

The supply landscape is also evolving

China’s dominant position in exports continues to strengthen, while markets such as the United States are facing supply gaps, driving a reshaping of industry growth models, competitive patterns, and the technical focus. From the demand side, accelerated AI data center construction is giving rise to rapid growth in demand for optical fiber and cable. Against the backdrop of steadily warming investment in AI infrastructure, the optical fiber and cable industry has considerable room for growth.

According to Guandian Tianxia’s forecast, by 2027, the share of optical fiber demand contributed by AI-driven data center internal and data center interconnection (DCI) scenarios will rise sharply from less than 5% in 2024 to 35%. According to CRU data, global optical fiber shipments in 2025 reached 662 million fiber-kilometers, up 15.3% year over year, exceeding CRU’s earlier forecast of 587 million fiber-kilometers. Among them, China’s optical fiber shipments were 372 million fiber-kilometers, up 7.5% year over year, accounting for 56.3% of global total shipments.

Judging from the tendering situation and commodity price trends, the center of gravity for optical fiber and cable prices continues to move upward

According to data from the Suzhou Optical Communication Association on March 24, recent tender announcements released by the China Telecom Group’s Heilongjiang Telecom Branch for its 2026 outdoor optical cable emergency procurement project have set a new high for G.652D optical fiber prices.

In January 2026, in Guangdong Telecom’s project centralized procurement, the highest ceiling price set for the “GYTA-single-mode G.652D-24F” optical cable’s per-cabled bundle unit price was 1,245 yuan per skin-length kilometer. After the centralized procurement failed, it was restarted in March, and the quoted price increased to 2,500 yuan per skin-length kilometer, an increase of more than 100%. In this Heilongjiang project, the highest ceiling price for the per-cabled bundle unit price of the same model optical cable was 3,737.43 yuan per skin-length kilometer. Meanwhile, the market price trend for hollow-core optical fiber is even higher. According to data from People’s Post and Telecommunications News, premiums for high-end fiber products are becoming prominent. The price of the special hollow-core fiber suited for AI computing infrastructure, G.654.E, rose to 240~260 yuan per fiber-kilometer, while frontier hollow-core optical fibers rose to 25k—50k yuan per fiber-kilometer.

With the explosive growth in demand for AI computing power driving continued improvement in both the internal and external interconnection transmission performance and demand of data centers, demand in the optical fiber and cable market is also being lifted. However, due to capacity tightening during the earlier industry downturn and the clearing out of small and medium-sized enterprises, the optical fiber and cable market will now concentrate on global leading enterprises, and manufacturers with full-industry-chain manufacturing capabilities for rod-and-fiber cables will benefit even more.

Risk notice

Risk of intensifying market competition; risk that key technological breakthroughs do not meet expectations; risk that downstream demand does not meet expectations; risk of fluctuations in raw material prices.

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