Power retailers in China’s Guangxi region lost more than 2 billion yuan (about $281 million) cumulatively from January to August 2026, according to a petition submitted on September 30 by nine retail subsidiaries of central state-owned enterprises. September alone is expected to bring losses above 1 billion yuan (about $140 million), and full-year losses could exceed 5 billion yuan (about $702 million), with a single leading retailer losing over 1 billion yuan annually. The document, obtained by Yicai, was addressed to authorities seeking emergency measures against systemic risk in the regional power market.
The core problem is a widening inversion between wholesale and retail prices. Higher global energy costs, driven by geopolitical shifts, pushed up generation costs and Guangxi’s spot prices, with the day-ahead average reaching 0.395 yuan per kilowatt-hour (about $0.055) in September. Spot prices may exceed 0.5 yuan (about $0.07) in the fourth quarter amid grid upgrades and plant maintenance. Meanwhile, retail contracts, mostly at fixed prices, averaged only about 0.260 yuan (about $0.037) per kilowatt-hour. Maximum losses on power bought from the spot market and sold to users surpassed 0.373 yuan (about $0.052) per kilowatt-hour, and some larger firms lost over 130 million yuan (about $18.3 million) in a single month. Industry insiders also blamed earlier low-price, irrational competition.
Warning of mass bankruptcies in the fourth quarter, the companies proposed four measures: postponing September electricity bill settlement, activating a wholesale-to-retail price pass-through mechanism, applying annual mechanism-volume settlement rules, and allowing orderly termination of retail contracts.
The problem is not unique to Guangxi. In Guangdong, 298 of 500 retailers, or 59.6 percent, were loss-making in the first half of 2026, according to the provincial power exchange.
Source: Yicai, October 9, 2026
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