Shanghai Platinum Week 2026 (6-10 July, Suzhou, China) comes at a pivotal moment for China’s platinum group metals (PGMs) market. Based upon its recent 15th Five-Year Plan, China is accelerating structural shifts across AI, new energy, environmental protection, and carbon reduction.
PGMs are being reinforced as critical and strategic metals underpinning these national priorities. For anyone participating in the global PGMs ecosystem, Shanghai Platinum Week (SPW), an annual conference and exhibition dedicated to PGMs, offers unparalleled insight into China’s direction of travel and access to the decision-makers shaping it.
China’s AI ambitions are a defining pillar. With their unique catalytic, thermal, and electrical properties making PGMs indispensable to the rollout of AI infrastructure, AI is rapidly emerging as a new end-use market for PGMs, with demand spanning semiconductors, optical interconnection, printed circuit boards, sensors, data storage, advanced materials, and energy supply for data centres.
Strategic priority
At the same time, China is scaling up hydrogen production faster than anywhere in the world. The 15th Five-Year Plan positions hydrogen as a strategic priority, supported by ambitious fuel cell electric vehicle (FCEV) deployment targets. PGM-based proton exchange membrane (PEM) technologies sit at the heart of this growth.
Financial market evolution is another critical theme. The Guangzhou Futures Exchange (GFEX) launched platinum and palladium futures in late 2025 as a significant new source of liquidity and price discovery for platinum and palladium, providing, for the first time, a domestic platform through which end-users can effectively hedge price risk. Its unique delivery mechanisms and planned expansion to enable international participation are expected to deepen liquidity and create new arbitrage opportunities globally. Complementing this is the recent launch of a new precious metals clearing system in Hong Kong, further strengthening regional market infrastructure.
Platinum investment bars, China. Picture credit: Point Gold
Investment demand is also undergoing a step-change. China’s platinum bar and coin market has grown from negligible levels in 2018 to an estimated 404 koz in 2025, highlighting the rapid development of investable products and channels and a growing appetite for physical platinum investment.
Alongside these developments, last year’s VAT changes in relation to platinum sales are expected to carry long-term positive implications for PGM recycling (and potential headwinds for jewellery and investment demand), while tightening vehicle emissions regulations are on the horizon, which could prove to be a boost to PGM automotive demand.
As Weibin Deng, the World Platinum Investment Council’s (WPIC) Regional Head of Asia Pacific, notes:
“China’s PGMs market is entering a new phase of development, where traditional demand drivers are being complemented by powerful new growth areas such as investment, GFEX, AI, and hydrogen. SPW provides an essential platform to understand these shifts and engage directly with the market participants driving them.”
SPW was founded and is organised by the WPIC. To find out more about SPW 2026, which is now in its sixth successive year, and register to attend, visit the SPW website.
