Here are five Fastmarkets stories you might have missed on Thursday January 21 that are worth another look.Brazil-based miner Vale and Japanese trading company Mitsui have signed a heads-of agreement to take the first step toward exiting their investment in the Moatize coal mine and the Nacala Logistics Corridor (NLC)...Read More

A differentiated fee structure designed to drive member-to-member trade away from the telephone market is being proposed by the London Metal Exchange as part of its discussion paper. The goal is to incentivize trade on the exchange's electronic trading platform, LMESelect, and is proposed to be achieved by cutting fees to trade electronically while raising fees for the telephone market by around 5...Read More

The London Metal Exchange and its clearing house are revisiting a proposal to transition to a different way of calculating its clearing methodology. The exchange announced its discussion paper on the topic on Tuesday January 19. The last attempt was made in 2017 and was rejected by LME members because it would make the provision of credit lines expensive and result in the rapid withdrawal of...Read More

Covid-19 appears to have claimed another casualty: the London Metal Exchange ring trading floor. The closure of the floor, now entering its 144th year, has been proposed in a discussion paper issued by the exchange earlier on Tuesday January 19.The open outcry floor may be old, but it didn't appear to have serious underlying health issues. It has successfully fought back against talk it was set to...Read More

Tin's forward price on the London metal Exchange rose to near seven-year highs above $22,000 per tonne on Thursday January 21 and aluminium and nickel posted gains just short of 1%, supported during trading by a weaker dollar index. The semiconductor metal rose to as high as $22,360 per tonne in the morning of Thursday, its highest price since July 2014. Tin's three-month price held at $22,000 pe...Read More

Hidden under the big headline of the ring closing, the London Metal Exchange's recent discussion paper also asked market participants for feedback on stocks, physical movements and market squeezes. The discussion paper on Tuesday January 19 caught people's attention because of its proposal to close the open-outcry trading ring, but participants told Fastmarkets other topics are far more controvers...Read More

The Singapore Exchange's (SGX) 65% Fe iron ore derivatives contract - which is settled against Fastmarkets' daily index for iron ore 65% Fe Brazil-origin fines, cfr Qingdao - set a new record for traded volumes at 5.9 million tonnes so far in January, according to SGX published data on Thursday January 21. Fastmarkets iron ore indices 62% Fe fines, cfr Qingdao: $171.51 per tonne, up $0.96 per tonn...Read More

Silver is volatile. But if you want to benefit from its big gains, you have to be willing to...by Peter Krauth via Streetwise ReportsThere's no consensus on whether silver is in its second or third secular bull market since the 1970s. That's because people define bull markets in different ways.But as I'll show you, it's not that important.What we do know is that silver enjoyed a huge bull market f...Read More

Activity in the European hot-rolled coil market was low on Thursday January 21 because buyers are holding back from making new deals due to an anticipated price fall, sources told Fastmarkets. Fastmarkets calculated its daily steel hot-rolled coil index, domestic, exw Northern Europe at ?,?713.00 ($864.26) per tonne on Thursday, down by ?,?2.50 per tonne day on day from ?,?715.50 per tonne on...Read More

Negative sentiment prevailed in the Turkish deep-sea scrap import market on Thursday January 21, with offer prices continuing to slide, sources told Fastmarkets.The most recent deal heard by sources -  a Baltic Sea cargo on Wednesday January 20 - put the HMS 1&2 (80:20) price at $440 per tonne cfr.The number of offers has increased since then and prices have gone down acco...Read More

As many as one-third of the current global portfolio of tailings storage facilities (TSFs) are impaired and in need of urgent intervention, according to the Switzerland-based Responsible Mining Foundation (RMF).This means that more than 730 million tonnes of tailings pose a risk, from among the roughly 223 billion tonnes of tailings stored in more than 30,000 TSFs, including active, inactive and a...Read More

Optimism fueled by upbeat US demand and rising expectations for Feb. 12 Chinese New Year. Polished scarcities supporting prices. Rough market robust as De Beers raises prices by estimated 5%, Alrosa by 7%. Cutters increasing production after buying high volume of rough. Alrosa 4Q sales volume +107% to 17M cts. De Beers cuts sightholder list for new contract period, prioritizes clients with factori...Read More

RAPAPORT... Sales at Alrosa showed a strong recovery in the fourth quarter of 2020 amid holiday demand and a rise in activity at Indian diamond manufacturers.Revenue from rough diamonds grew 29% year on year to $1.14 billion, the company reported Thursday, as a release of pent-up demand enabled the Russian miner to offload goods that had been unsellable earlier in the year. The company's roug...Read More

RAPAPORT... The Women's Jewelry Association (WJA) has chosen Susan Chandler, the chief merchandising officer for Citizen Watch America, as president-elect of its international board of directors.In her role at WJA, Chandler will help foster community, connection and collaboration within the trade, the association said Wednesday. Last year, she served as the WJA sponsorship chair, and was instrumen...Read More

RAPAPORT... The International Gemological Institute (IGI) has updated its grading report for synthetic diamonds to include information about post-growth treatments.The reports will now outline the growth process for untreated chemical vapor deposition (CVD) or High Pressure-High Temperature (HPHT) stones, the lab said Wednesday. They will also specifically indicate those diamonds are "as grown wit...Read More

RAPAPORT... India's polished-diamond exports fell 31% to $14.17 billion in 2020, according to Rapaport calculations based on data from the country's Gem & Jewellery Export Promotion Council (GJEPC).A slump during the peak of the coronavirus crisis outweighed a recovery in the fourth quarter, with polished exports up 38% year on year in December amid holiday demand and restocking."The rece...Read More

Aurubis expects high copper prices and consequent availability of scrap metal to boost its earnings for its 2021 financial year beyond previous forecasts, it said in a release to investors on Thursday January 21. The German smelting company, which is Europe's largest copper and tin producer, raised its forecast earnings for the financial year ending September 2021 before taxes to ?,?270-330 m...Read More

(IDEX Online) - Namakwa Diamonds is to sell another exceptional fancy pink diamond recovered from its Kao mine, in Lesotho.The 25.97-ct rough stone (pictured), named Pink Dawn, comes from the same geological domain as  several other significant fancy-color stones - the 36.06-ct Pink Storm (sold in 2014) the 3.06-ct  Purple Princess (2017) and the 29.59-ct Rose of Kao (2018). The Pin...Read More

A summary of Canada-headquartered Lundin Mining's output figures for the fourth quarter and full-year 2020, as stated in its production report published on Wednesday January 20.In brief Lundin's full-year production was in line with its previous guidance of 217,000-232,000 tonnes for copper, 142,000-146,000 tonnes for zinc and 15,000-18,000 tonnes for nickel....Read More

(IDEX Online) - Alrosa's sales of rough and polished diamonds soared by a third in the last quarter of 2020, up to $1.22bn (q-on-q).The Russian state-owned miner reported average realized prices in Q4 were down by 38 per cent to $67.40 per carat q-on-q.But by the end of the year demand for for rough diamonds had become strong and stable, it said in its Q4 and 12M 2020 operating results, "driv...Read More