Trading activity in the seaborne coking coal market was muted on Monday July 22 after an active stretch last week.A cargo of premium hard coking coal was offered at $175 per tonne fob Australia on the Global Coal trading platform during the day, down $1 per tonne from last Friday, sources said.A Chinese end-user source said that mills in the country were concerned about uncertainties associated wi...Read More
Fastmarkets has discontinued the publication of the stainless steel grade-304 Europe raw materials index, with effect from Monday July 22.After a two-month consultation period, Fastmarkets has decided to discontinue the assessment of the stainless steel 304 index domestic, exw EU.This index, which was intended to represent the costs of the raw materials needed to produce grade-304 stainless steel,...Read More
Seaborne iron ore prices fell across the board on Monday July 22, amid environmental restrictions imposed on steelmakers in north China.Fastmarkets' index for iron ore 62% Fe fines, cfr Qingdao: $118.33 per tonne, down $3.46 per tonne. Fastmarkets' index for iron ore 62% Fe Pilbara Blend Fines, cfr Qingdao: $118.25 per tonne, down $3.46 per tonne. Fastmarkets' index for iron ore 62% Fe low-alumina...Read More
Here are five Fastmarkets MB stories you might have missed on Monday July 22 that are worth another look.The wide differential between ferro-vanadium prices in China and Europe has prompted some European vanadium suppliers to deliver their cargoes to China to take advantage of the more favorable price in the Asian country, market sources told Fastmarkets. ERG has appointed Telf AG the exclusive of...Read More
The premium for aluminium billet in Italy has fallen to its lowest in over two years due to aggressively low offers from suppliers and continued poor demand. Fastmarkets assessed the aluminium 6063 extrusion billet premium, ddp Italy (Brescia region), at $330-350 per tonne on Friday July 19, down from $340-360 per tonne the previous week. This is lowest since January 20, 2017, when it was $330-340...Read More
The prices paid for base metals traded on the London Metal Exchange were almost universally suppressed during morning trading on Monday July 22, with uninspiring macro data precipitating thin trading volumesTin was the only metal to buck the trend and trade at parity with the afternoon kerb close on July 19, which is around $17,800 per tonne. The LME three-month tin contract may be holding on acco...Read More
Rising tension over Iran and a reduction in expectations on the size of the next US Federal Reserve rate cut were weighing on sentiment this morning, Monday July 22.Last week the market started to price-in a 50-basis-point cut in the US benchmark interest rate at the Federal Open Market Committee's (FOMC) July 30-31 meeting, but now a 25-basis-point cut now seems more likely.Tensions in the Middle...Read More
Base metals prices on the Shanghai Futures Exchange were all down during morning trading on Monday July 22, with nickel and zinc leading the decline with drops of 2.8% and 1.7% respectively. The rest of the complex recorded more marginal declines: lead (-1%), copper (-0.6%), aluminium (-0.5%) and tin (-0.2%).The broad-based weakness comes amid a recovery in the dollar that saw the US currency recl...Read More
Hot testing of ArcelorMittal Kryvyi Rih's new continuous casting machine (CCM No3) has been halted after a site search by the Security Service of Ukraine (SBU) on Saturday July 20.The search took place as part of an investigation into the contamination of the environment, sparked by a recent visit by Ukraine's new president Volodymyr Zelensky to his home town of Kryvyi Rih, after which he&nbs...Read More
Weaker demand from the automotive market and high mill capacity have softened cold-heading quality (CHQ) wire rod prices, while high carbon wire rod prices remained flat from the previous month. Fastmarkets AMM's monthly pricing assessment for cold-heading quality wire rod North American delivered duty paid Great Lakes region dropped to $39.50 per hundredweight ($790 per short ton) on Fr...Read More
Plate prices in the United States have continued to slide due to weak market fundamentals, but the recent stabilization of hot-rolled coil prices could support the free-falling plate market, sources said.Fastmarkets' price assessment for steel cut-to-length plate carbon grade, fob mill US, fell to $35.50 per hundredweight ($710 per short ton) on Friday July 19, down by 2.7% from $36.50 per cwt a w...Read More
RAPAPORT... US retail sales rose in June, amid improved consumersentiment and a healthier economic outlook, according to the National RetailFederation (NRF). Total purchase value grew 2.3% year on year in June, withthe three-month moving average, which includes April, May and June sales, up3.7% over the same period a year ago. The moving average for the three monthsto May rose 3.3% over the y...Read More
RAPAPORT... Botswana Diamonds has raised the funds needed to continueoperations, and expects to hold its first sale by the fourth quarter. The company, which has struggled with challenges that hitits bottom line, had questioned itsability to continue as a going concern. It had previously recorded losses due to currency fluctuations, an impairment charge, and the cost of buying Alrosa out of a...Read More
RAPAPORT... Shares in Petra Diamonds slipped 6% in early trading Monday after the minerreported it would lower its production for fiscal 2020. The company expects to produce about 3.8 million carats inthe financial year ending June 2020, as opposed to 3.9 million caratsin fiscal 2019, it said Monday. While run-of-mine production is expected toremain flat, the decrease will come from lower pro...Read More
The global steel slab market has been squeezed by increased competition, higher production costs and modest demand in the principal sales outlets at the start of the third quarter of 2019.Suppliers in Russia, Ukraine and Brazil were facing low sales to the United States market because of the protectionist measures in place there. As a result, these suppliers have begun to look for alternative dest...Read More
European buyers have already bought about 30% more than the yearly quota for imports from China of hot-dipped galvanized coil (HDG) grades used by the automotive industry, market sources have told Fastmarkets.The full annual quota allocated to material from China for the period from July 1, 2019, to June 30, 2020, was 527,164 tonnes. This quota was fully taken up just a couple days after the new q...Read More
The United States Department of Commerce has revised the final dumping and subsidy margins, and cash deposit rates, to be imposed on imports of rebar from Turkey.These were based on affirmative final determinations by Commerce and by the US International Trade Administration, published on July 18.Commerce determined that several companies "received countervailable subsidies during the period of re...Read More
RAPAPORT... The Antwerp World Diamond Centre (AWDC) will no longer provide financial backing to the city's diamond-technology unit, citing difficult conditions in the local industry. "As a result of the high cost of labor in our country,almost the entirety of our diamond manufacturing has relocated abroad," AWDCspokeswoman Margaux Donckier said Friday. The AWDC established the Scientific and Techn...Read More
China's hot-rolled coil prices regained some strength on Monday July 22 after local authorities in Tangshan, the steelmaking hub in northern China, reiterated production cuts for steelmakers under their jurisdiction.DomesticEastern China (Shanghai): 3,880-3,900 yuan ($564-567) per tonne, up 20 yuan per tonneNorthern China (Tianjin): 3,850-3,860 yuan per tonne, up 10 yuan per tonneSpot prices rose...Read More
Quality emerges at Galan's blue-chip lithium addressSPONSOREDgalan lithiumIn its latest sustainability technical report, Antamina said it planned to reconfigure the ore crusher platform and use a semi-mobile crusher with a 13,200 tonnes per hour capacity, which will see the operation process some 85 million tonnes per year of material.The company also plans to optimise the internal water manag...Read More