The United Kingdom's state-owned railway infrastructure group Network Rail has made an 'indicative offer' for British Steel's rail services business.British Steel's UK assets comprise the Scunthorpe steelworks, which have a production capacity of 2.80 million tonnes per year; two mills in Teesside; an engineering workshop in Workington; and a design consultancy in York. The company also has a...Read More
Turkey imported 581,338 tonnes of flat steel in May 2019, down by 32.49% from the corresponding month in 2018, when 861,166 tonnes arrived in the country, according to the Turkish Statistical Institute (T?oeIK).Sources who spoke with Fastmarkets noted that demand for flat steel in Turkey was weak in January and February, before the local elections were held on March 31. So, import volumes decrease...Read More
ArcelorMittal finalized the sale of a number of its European steel assets to Liberty House Group on June 30, the world's biggest steelmaker said on Monday July 1.The sale was part of the divestment package agreed with the European Commission (EC) investigation into ArcelorMittal's acquisition of Italian flat steel producer Ilva.Assets in the sale to Liberty House include a steel pla...Read More
Nickel's three-month price on the London Metal Exchange was lower at the close of trading on Monday July 1, failing to sustain recent gains while poor data from China's manufacturing sector damped buying sentiment.Three-month nickel futures closed at $12,350 per tonne during the afternoon, down by a little less than 3% from an intraday high of $12,850 per tonne, its highest level since April.Marke...Read More
Import prices for flat-rolled steel products have shown broad increases in South America over the past week, with more expensive offers heard from China, although deals remained scarce because of the cautious stances adopted by importers in the region and by Chinese exporters.Fastmarkets' assessment of the South American import price for hot-rolled coil (HRC) was $535-545 per tonne cfr on June 28....Read More
CIS steel billet producers continued to increase their offer prices for foreign customers on Monday July 1, following the recent surge in import scrap prices in Turkey and iron ore prices in China.This pushed up Fastmarkets' daily CIS export billet index to $420 per tonne fob Black Sea on Monday, against $415 per tonne fob on June 28.Offers of Russian billet were heard in the market within the pri...Read More
Despite China's ban of low-quality copper scrap imports since the beginning of 2019, the volume of copper units contained in scrap imports has defied expectations by rising in the first five months of this year. Between January and May this year, China imported 682,508 gross tonnes of copper scrap, according to customs data. All of the imports are of the higher-grade category 6 scrap. This is down...Read More
Here are five Fastmarkets MB stories you might have missed on Monday July 1 that are worth another look.Nickel's three-month price on the London Metal Exchange fell at the close of trading on Monday July 1, failing to sustain recent gains while poor data from China's manufacturing sector damped buying sentiment.Vanadium producer Largo Resources "has adopted the conservative strategy" of...Read More
Spanish stainless steelmaker Acerinox has appointed Mark Davis chief executive officer of its Bahru Stainless joint venture in Malaysia, it said on Monday July 1.Davis replaces Oswald Wolfe, who becomes director of institutional relations at Acerinox's headquarters in Madrid, Spain. Wolfe had been CEO of...Read More
Despite China's ban of low-quality copper scrap imports since the beginning of 2019, the volume of copper units contained in scrap imports has defied expectations by rising in the first five months of this year. Between January and May this year, China imported 682,508 gross tonnes of copper scrap, according to customs data. All of the imports are of the higher-grade category 6 scrap. This is down...Read More
Nickel market participants cite technical squeezes as the root cause of a 9% increase in nickel prices over June, with Shanghai and London exchange contracts targeted amid slack supply and demand.The LME three-month nickel price peaked at $12,850 per tonne on the morning of Monday July 1, its highest since April and an increase of more than 9% from a low of $11,605 per tonne on June 7.Despite a 2....Read More
Nickel's three-month price on the London Metal Exchange was lower at the close of trading on Monday July 1, failing to sustain recent gains while poor data from China's manufacturing sector damped buying sentiment.Three-month nickel futures closed at $12,350 per tonne during the afternoon, down by a little less than 3% from an intraday high of $12,850 per tonne, its highest level since April.Marke...Read More
Nickel market participants cite technical squeezes as the root cause of a 9% increase in nickel prices over June, with Shanghai and London exchange contracts targeted amid slack supply and demand.The LME three-month nickel price peaked at $12,850 per tonne on the morning of Monday July 1, its highest since April and an increase of more than 9% from a low of $11,605 per tonne on June 7.Despite a 2....Read More
Pessimism grew in the seaborne coking coal market on Monday July 1, with transactions and offers declining further.A shipment of premium low-vol hard coking coal, scheduled for loading over July 4-14, was sold to an end user in northern China over the weekend at $192.94 per tonne cfr China, according to various sources.This is down around $4 per tonne compared with a transaction last Friday involv...Read More
Nickel market participants cite technical squeezes as the root cause of a 9% increase in nickel prices over June, with Shanghai and London exchange contracts targeted amid slack supply and demand.The LME three-month nickel price peaked at $12,850 per tonne on the morning of Monday July 1, its highest since April and an increase of more than 9% from a low of $11,605 per tonne on June 7.Despite a 2....Read More
Turkish steel producers continued to book more deep-sea scrap cargoes for August shipments, with prices rising further, sources said on Monday July 1.A steel mill in the Marmara region booked a Baltic Sea cargo, comprising 20,000 tonnes of HMS 1&2 (80:20) at $293 per tonne and 20,000 tonnes of bonus at $303 per tonne cfr, late on June 28.The same mill also booked a European cargo on Friday, compri...Read More
Here are five Fastmarkets MB stories you might have missed on Monday July 1 that are worth another look.Nickel's three-month price on the London Metal Exchange fell at the close of trading on Monday July 1, failing to sustain recent gains while poor data from China's manufacturing sector damped buying sentiment.Vanadium producer Largo Resources "has adopted the conservative strategy" of...Read More
Copper stocks in Shanghai-bonded warehouses in June were at their lowest since late in January because of better import opportunities in China in May and June, while China's less refined copper imports in the second quarter dropped after a top importer had less credit issued to it.Nickel stocks in the Shanghai-bonded zone dropped in June due to an abrupt opening of the import arbitrage window, whi...Read More
Fastmarkets is standardizing the names of some of its base metals price assessments principally to identify whether they are premiums or all-in prices.Although Fastmarkets is specifying in the description of each affected price, this is not new information - the methodology for the discovery of those prices is unchanged. We will, however, update our price methodology documents to reflect the stand...Read More
The outcome of the Group of 20 (G20) summit in Japan that was held on June 28-29, saw the United States and China agree to resume trade talks, which has boosted optimism for a trade deal. This has given most non-haven markets a lift, this despite further weakness in manufacturing purchasing managers' index (PMI) data.China's Caixin manufacturing PMI dropped to 49.4 from 50.2, Japan's manufacturing...Read More