Turkey's military pension fund, OYAK, has reached a provisional agreement to buy steelmaker British Steel, OYAK said on Friday August 16. OYAK is the biggest shareholder of Turkey's largest steel producer, Erdemir Group, and this agreement is a step toward in its goal to become a regional leader in steel sector, OYAK said. British Steel entered into compulsory liquidation in May 2019 and rece...Read More
The Chinese government has revived a 25% tariff on imports of US automobiles and a 5% tariff on auto parts, set to take effect on December 15, which some market participants worry could imperil future investments as well as steel and base metals demand.Chinese tariffs on US-made cars and auto parts were placed on hold in April, but the Chinese government reinstated them on Friday August 23. Beijin...Read More
Global scrap prices trended downward during the week ended Friday August 23, negatively affected by lackluster demand with buyers taking a pessimistic outlook on scrap prices in the near term. Turkish import prices down on tepid demand US export prices flat on lack of trading Asian import prices decline, buyers wait for lower prices Indian prices hit new year-to-date low.TurkeyTurkish mills finall...Read More
The import pig iron market in the United States was slow and soft in the week to Friday August 23, with most participants preferring to remain in wait-and-see mode amid price trend uncertainty, sources told Fastmarkets.Fastmarkets' price assessment for pig iron import, cfr Gulf of Mexico, US, slipped to $360-365 per tonne on August 23, down by $3-5 per tonne from $365-368 per tonne the week before...Read More
An overview of the battery raw materials markets and their latest price moves.Read More
The dream of building a new world-class copper-gold mine in Pakistan in an area bordering Afghanistan and Iran has been dashed, for now at least. The saga of Tethyan Copper Co's (TCC) efforts to develop the Reko Diq mine found resolution last week with an International Centre for Settlement of Investment Disputes (ICSID) ruling in favor of TCC following a dispute that has rumbled on for years.TCC,...Read More
The London Metal Exchange has just finished its trial to calculate nickel prices using a volume weighted average price (VWAP) method on the exchange's electronic trading platform. If early indications are anything to go by, metals market participants did not embrace this method of price discovery in the way some had anticipated. For three months since Monday March 18, closing prices for nickel car...Read More
The United States Secretary of Commerce has joined the growing chorus of voices questioning the current method of setting the US Midwest aluminium premium. Wilbur Ross said the US Midwest aluminium premium is at inflated levels that do not justify the cost of transportation and logistical handling costs that it was originally designed to reflect. His view is being echoed by a number of...Read More
The London Metal Exchange three-month nickel price lost gains made over the course of the trading day to close at $15,665 per tonne on Friday August 23, down 1.3% from the intraday high of $15,860 per tonne, despite a healthy 11,294-lot turnover, the highest since August 8. A significant 22,620 lots were traded on August 8 when a short-covering rally driven by Chinese investment buyers pushed the...Read More
Barring zinc and nickel, base metal stocks at Shanghai Futures Exchange-approved warehouses were lower week on week on Friday August 23, with the biggest fall in deliverable lead stocks, which slumped by 9.6% or 3,544 tonnes to 33,065 tonnes. According to the SHFE's latest inventory report, the Zhejiang Tianchuan warehouse in Zhejiang recorded the most lead stock withdrawals this week with 3,401 t...Read More
Seaborne coking coal prices were flat on Friday August 23, leaving segments of the market wondering if they have bottomed out.Fastmarkets indicesPremium hard coking coal, fob DBCT: $153.67 per tonne, unchangedPremium hard coking coal, cfr Jingtang: $166.12 per tonne, unchangedHard coking coal, fob DBCT: $138.76 per tonne, unchangedHard coking coal, cfr Jingtang: $153 per tonne, unchangedLow-vol PC...Read More
China's month-on-month new electric vehicles (NEV) sales rebounded in August after month-on-month declines in June and July. The drop in sales between May and June was the first drop since September 2016, but Fastmarkets MB had expected Chinese NEV sales to dip temporarily after the June subsidy changes came into effect because consumers and NEV manufacturers would have to adjust to the new subsid...Read More
The increasing consumption of scrap and a potential shift toward the electric-arc furnace (EAF) steelmaking route from the basic oxygen furnace (BOF) route in China are medium- to long-term threats to demand for steelmaking raw materials, while in the near team coking coal import volumes will continue to be affected by iron ore procurement strategies.This was the basis of Fastmarkets research team...Read More
Iron ore prices fell sharply in the second half of November after climbing through October, with prices for higher-grade material pioneering the decline.Fastmarkets MB daily benchmark for 65% Fe fines dropped by 22% by Monday November 26 after peaking on October 29. The 62% Fe iron ore index declined by 16% over the period, as some Chinese steelmakers started to seek larger volumes of cheaper ores...Read More
The steel scrap sector in the United States still depends on exports to Turkey, a member of the Fastmarkets research team said during the ferrous session at the Bureau of International Recycling (BIR) conference in London.This dependence persists despite the changes in the international markets created by the US' imposition of its Section 232 tariffs on imports of steel products, metals analyst Le...Read More
An overview of the noble alloys markets and their latest price moves.Read More
Indian domestic prices for hot-rolled coil (HRC) remained stable in August with import volumes of this key upstream commodity coming to a halt, Fastmarkets heard on Friday August 23."We have been able to maintain domestic HRC prices for the current month because there is no threat of low-priced HRC imports entering the [Indian domestic] market for some [foreseeable] time," an official from an Indi...Read More
The government of Canada has announced measures to prevent the transshipment of aluminium into the United States, building on commitments made when the US removed its Section 232 import tariffs in May.As of September 1, aluminium products will form part of Canada's Import Control List (ICL) under the Export & Import Permits Act.As a result, importers from next month will be required to cite the ap...Read More
The London Metal Exchange three-month nickel price lost gains made over the course of the trading day to close at $15,665 per tonne on Friday August 23, down 1.3% from the intraday high of $15,860 per tonne, despite a healthy 11,294-lot turnover, the highest since August 8. A significant 22,620 lots were traded on August 8 when a short-covering rally driven by Chinese investment buyers pushed the...Read More
Treatment and refining charges (TC/RCs) for spot copper concentrates rose marginally in mid-August following five consecutive weeks of declines, with few smelters in the market buying tonnages at stable terms.Fastmarkets' copper concentrate TC/RC index basis cif Asia Pacific rebounded to $50.20 per tonne/ 5.02 cents per lb on August 23, up from $49.60 per tonne/ 4.96 cents per lb a week ago - whic...Read More