The latest forecasts from Fastmarkets' team of analysts are ready to view.This month's key ferro-alloy forecast highlights:?EUR? Impressive advances in ore and alloy prices persisted in March, with most markets posting significant price gains. Strengthening demand from steelmakers along with supply shortages and depleted inventories in numerous markets, as well as freight and transportation...Read More
Inner Mongolia, China's ferro-chrome production heartland, has imposed restrictions on its metallurgical sector in a move that has fueled the high-carbon ferro-chrome markets in China and Europe, and although this may ease off, the gains were unlikely to be lost while alloy ramp-ups continue, sources have told Fastmarkets.The decision to restrict energy consumption in Inner Mongolia since December...Read More
The latest forecasts from Fastmarkets' team of analysts are ready to view.This month's key ferro-alloy forecast highlights:?EUR?In a strong start to the year, January saw ore and alloy pricing gains across all markets priced by Fastmarkets - with the exception of Chinese silicon metal export prices, which retreated slightly last month after posting impressive gains in December 2020.The combination...Read More
The latest forecasts from Fastmarkets' team of analysts are ready to view.Key ferro-alloy forecast highlights for the coming months:?EUR? A strong recovery in both bulk and noble alloys is expected in 2021 but the markets are unlikely to return to the levels seen before the outbreak of the Covid-19 pandemic. We have seen a quicker-than-expected recovery across various regions amid the economic fal...Read More
The latest forecasts from Fastmarkets' team of analysts are ready to view.Fastmarkets analysts were invited to present our outlook for the coking coal market at Coaltrans Asia, held online on November 23-25. One of the key topics at the event was the trade tensions between China and Australia, which overtook Mongolia to become the largest coking coal exporter to China this year...Read More
The latest forecasts from Fastmarkets' team of analysts are ready to view.Iron ore remains the most bullish commodity of the year, with prices fuelled by Chinese demand and supply disruptions in Brazil, along with bullish sentiment. But prices are expected to come down because Brazilian exports have begun to recover, and have reached their highest level since the Brumadinho dam disaster in 2019. W...Read More
The latest forecasts from Fastmarkets' team of analysts are ready to view.In the iron ore market, supply issues including heavy rains at the start of the year, followed by staffing problems during the Covid-19 pandemic, have affected exports from Brazil. This has helped Australia gain a larger market share, but since June, Brazilian export volumes have returned to levels last seen before the...Read More
The latest forecasts from Fastmarkets' team of analysts are ready to view.Chinese blast furnace (BF) utilization rates have stagnated and iron ore port stock volumes are rising, reaching their highest levels since March, which suggests that iron ore supply is becoming excessive while demand is not growing. Unsurprisingly, prices dropped last week and we expect the trend to continue. The market has...Read More
The latest forecasts from Fastmarkets' team of analysts is ready to view.With nickel prices down by almost 20% over the space of around ten days during late February and early March, one might have been expecting us to be reporting sharply-lower prices of stainless steel, at least for the most common nickel-containing grades of stainless steel.This is not the case, at least in Europe and the Unite...Read More
The latest forecasts from Fastmarkets' team of analysts is ready to view.We spoke in our previous tracker of stainless steel prices ending 2020 on a high. That trend has continued during early 2021 and, in fact, the upward rally in prices has increased its momentum.Compared with the monthly price increase of some 5% seen at the end of 2020, prices for grade-304 stainless steel in al...Read More
The latest forecasts from Fastmarkets' team of analysts is ready to view.Prices of stainless steel are generally set to reach highs for the year as 2020 comes to a close. For the most common nickel-containing grades of stainless steel, this upward trend is being driven above all by rising nickel prices, which themselves are hitting relatively high levels into the end of 2020.The price increases si...Read More
The latest forecasts from Fastmarkets' team of analysts is ready to view.While much commentary has been written about Asian economies performing far better than those elsewhere this year during the global Covid-19 pandemic, it is stainless steel markets in Europe and the United States that are ending the year in better shape than their Asian counterparts.We do not talk of demand levels or demand g...Read More
RAPAPORT... Michael Hill's sales rose in the third fiscal quarter as robust e-commerce growth compensated for store closures in Australia and Canada.Group revenue climbed 12% to AUD 118.5 million ($91.5 million) in the three months ending March 31, the jeweler reported last week. During the quarter, the company was forced to close 72 stores in Australia, 16 in New Zealand and 46 in Canada temporar...Read More
RAPAPORT... Sotheby's garnered $53.9 million from its Hong Kong Magnificent Jewels auction, with two bracelets stealing the show.A diamond and rock-crystal bracelet by Cartier, featuring a pear-shaped, 63.66-carat, D-color, internally flawless diamond, brought in $6 million, Sotheby's said Wednesday. The piece, which took nearly 2,000 hours to create, was originally estimated to fetch up to $8.4 m...Read More
Market sentiment in the European hot-rolled coil segment has remained bullish so far this week, with buyers struggling to secure volumes from both domestic and overseas suppliers, sources told Fastmarkets in Wednesday April 21. Fastmarkets calculated its daily steel hot-rolled coil index, domestic, exw Northern Europe at ?,?956.25 ($1,151.90) per tonne on Wednesday, up by ?,?2.50 per tonne fr...Read More
RAPAPORT... Revenue at Lucapa Diamond Company soared in the first three months of the year as the miner benefited from a rebound in the rough market.Sales from the company's Lulo mine in Angola increased 22% year on year to $9.5 million for the quarter ending March 31, Lucapa said Monday. An 89% surge in sales volume to 5,313 carats outweighed a 35% drop in the average price to $1,796 per car...Read More
RAPAPORT... Kering's jewelry and watch divisions grew strongly in the first quarter amid a market recovery in the North America and Asia-Pacific regions.Revenue from the company's "other houses" segment, which includes jewelry and watches, rose 29% year on year to EUR 714.3 million ($857.8 million) for the three months ending March 31, the company said Tuesday."The jewelry houses achieved an excel...Read More
RAPAPORT... India's polished-diamond exports more than doubled year on year in March, reflecting a release of pent-up demand and a favorable comparison with the start of the coronavirus crisis in 2020. Shipments stood at $2.16 billion for the month, up from $965 million a year earlier, according to data the country's Gem & Jewellery Export Promotion Council (GJEPC) released in recent days...Read More
(IDEX Online) - Diamond manufacturers in Surat fear another exodus of migrant workers, as India suffers a second wave of coronavirus. The industry was crippled last March when as many as half its 750,000 artisans returned to their villages in Gujurat and beyond. The number of Covid cases across India is higher than ever. The daily average of new infections over the last week is 249...Read More
Prices for steel hollow sections in Europe moved higher on Wednesday April 21 because feedstock costs were continuing to climb, sources told Fastmarkets.Fastmarkets' price assessment for steel sections (medium), domestic, delivered Northern Europe, was ?,?1,050-1,120 ($1,265-1,349) per tonne on April 21, up from ?,?950-1,050 per tonne on April 14."Prices have increased very quickly and aggressivel...Read More