Although base metals are under pressure in the short term, we have a bullish bias to our 2018 price forecasts given the supportive background of solid global economic growth and the fact that all six base metal markets look set to be in fundamental deficit this year. But each has a slightly different supply-side story and this aspect should be the main differentiator. For example, zinc's narrative...Read More

It's almost like a match made in heaven for aficionados of both Tequila and silver. Here's the details...from The Silver InstituteStoli Group USA's Cenote Tequila, is filtering its water used for tequila through silver ions.In a recent on-line interview, master distiller Arturo Fuente discussed the company's Cenote brand and his job as distiller. He noted: "We play a key role in overseeing the ent...Read More

Despite Chinese winter smelter production cuts generally falling short of expectations and domestic stocks continuing to climb - both of which suggest the market remains far more comfortably supplied at this point than aluminium bulls had been anticipating - prices still rallied into the year-end to reach $2,290/tonne for the first time since March 2012.And after a New Year pull-back the strength...Read More

Copper prices were working lower during most of December and in the absence of any bullish triggers we had been expecting that trend to continue. But in late December, fund buying picked up aggressively, driving prices to a fresh multi-year high of $7,203/tonne. There was little fundamental justification for this and we should consider it a warning that speculators and investors feeling optimistic...Read More

Lead prices remain on their steady uptrend since the summer lows last year and in January have been eroding resistance around October's 6-year high above $2,600/tonne. We expect the underlying strengthening fundamentals, especially on the supply side, to maintain the uptrend this year. Primary producers may well struggle to respond to higher lead prices and we doubt there is much hoarded scrap aro...Read More

The Indian government's plans of hitting 300 million tonnes of steel capacity by 2030 sounds overambitious in the current scenario given that output only managed to reach the 101 million tonne mark in 2017 - indicating three-fold (Read More

After suffering for some seven years through to 2015, the world's steelmakers have had cause for cheer over the past couple of years. After some heavy losses and write-downs, they finally appear to have emerged from the wreckage of the global financial crisis. An economic upswing has taken root in most regions of the world, Chinese steel output and export growth has slowed noticeably, and steel pr...Read More

For a number of years problems at Ilva, the largest steelworks in Europe, have been casting shadow over the performance of the whole Italian steel industry. Will an acquisition of Ilva by a consortium led by ArcelorMittal, now in its final stage, be a game changer for the market?Following multiple reports of environmental and health problems caused by the Taranto plant, in 2013 Ilva was placed und...Read More

China ended steel production in all of the country's illegal induction furnaces by the end of June last year, it ha claimed.Most operators in China are primarily small private mills that use low-quality scrap to produce substandard rebar. This is mixed with grade III (HRB400) rebar and sold at a discount to construction contractors.For a long period, the government had neither a record of nor cont...Read More

Seaborne pig iron has become relatively competitive versus ferrous scrap over the past year in most regions, and China is no exception. As the first chart below illustrates, the gap between the MBR's proxy for imported pig iron price in China and the Metal Bulletin's Chinese domestic heavy melt scrap price assessment had shrunk by late 2017. The premium averaged $17 per tonne this year to date, co...Read More

The closure of some induction furnaces in China in 2016 followed by the government's crackdown on all unlicensed IFs in mid-2017 freed up some scrap volumes, albeit arguably of low-quality material. Chinese domestic scrap prices came under pressure from the increased supply, which prevented them from keeping pace with the rise in steel and other raw material markets in the fourth quarter of 2016;...Read More

About a year ago, metallurgical coal embarked on a long journey of great volatility and disruption. It emerged as the best performing commodity in 2016 after several years of declining prices. Prices have dropped and spiked several times since then and the volatility continued in 2017 with a cyclone disrupting the market and eventually also affecting the way the commodity is priced. Although therm...Read More

The past year, soaring metallurgical coal prices have greatly affected the costs involved in producing pig iron, a form of crude iron which is the product of the blast furnace. Metal Bulletin Research's Global Steel Cost Service details how coking coal and coke costs usually averaged around 35% of total pig iron production expenditure in 2014 and 2015 while iron ore stood for the majority of costs...Read More

Peru's National Institute of Statistics and Informatics released a preliminary report stating that in May 2018 and for the third month in a row, the mining and oil sectors continued to grow.According to Reuters, both sectors showed a 1.86 per cent interannual growth which was driven by increased production of oil, natural gas, zinc and tin.In detail, the oil sector showed an interannual growth of...Read More

Indonesia's state-owned mining holding company PT Inalum is close to finalising a multi-billion-dollar deal to acquire a majority stake in the giant Grasberg copper mine, government officials said on Saturday.Situated in Indonesia's eastern-most province of Papua, Grasberg, the world's second-largest copper mine, is owned and operated by Freeport Indonesia (PTFI), a subsidiary of U.S.-based Freepo...Read More

Sienna Resources(TSXV: SIE) announced that it has started an extended sampling and geophysical program on the Sl??ttberg nickel-copper cobalt project, located 25 kilometres northwest of Falun, Sweden.In a press release, the Vancouver-based company explained that the historic mining camp hosts cobalt-nickel-copper rich massive sulfide mineralization. Therefore, its engineers will be taking samples...Read More

SHANGHAI, Jul 2 (SMM) – This is a roundup of global macroeconomic news last weekend and what is expected today.Last weekendThe US dollar index fell below 95 to close at 94.5 last Friday night, with pressure from a strengthened euro as the European leaders reached a migration deal. LME base metals saw mixed trading with zinc leading the loss and closing 1.7% lower on sluggish demand and...Read More

Investing.com - Gold prices are likely to remain under pressure this week as traders digest the minutes of the Federal Reserve’s June meeting on Thursday, when markets re-open after Wednesday’s Independence Day holiday.The Fed hiked interest rates in June and signaled for the first time that they could lift rates four times this year, a typically gold-negative factor.On Friday, metals...Read More

RAPAPORT... Strong rough demand and the sale of a 95-carat diamond drovean increase in revenue at Mountain Province's June tender, the miner said. The company sold 356,000 carats of rough from its Gahcho Ku?(C)mine for $30.3 million, at an average of $85 per carat, it reported last week.The purchase price for the 95-carat stone was more than double the miner'sprevious record for a single stone, th...Read More

RAPAPORT... Lucara Diamond Corp. will focus on the high-value section ofits Karowe mine that produced the 1,109-carat Lesedi La Rona, after a surveyindicated the area contained more large stones than previously predicted. A sample of 13,562 carats from the south lobe's EM/PK(S)unit yielded 47 diamonds weighing more than 10.8 carats, including one over 100carats and six greater than 50 carats, Luc...Read More