Turkish deep-sea scrap import prices went up on Tuesday February 5 following the sale of a higher priced cargo, sources told Fastmarkets.A steel mill in the Marmara region booked a Baltic cargo comprising 25,500 tonnes of HMS 1&2 (80:20) scrap at $321.50 per tonne cfr and 7,500 tonnes of bonus at $331.50 per tonne cfr.This new cargo price is an increase when compared to the sale of a European carg...Read More

Here are five Fastmarkets MB stories you might have missed on Tuesday February 5 that are worth another look.Honda Motor Co Ltd aims to electrify around two-thirds of the vehicles it produces by 2030, Honda managing officer Noriya Kaihara said at the 25th Mining Indaba in Cape Town, South Africa.Japan's Panasonic is considering investing in the upstream part of the battery raw materials indus...Read More

Manganese ore prices are showing signs of recovery after a poor start to 2019 that was blamed largely on bearish sentiment around silico-manganese and steel markets in China.Low-grade manganese ore prices have edged up in late January amid a flurry of demand ahead of Chinese New Year, which meant some of the firmer offers in the market were successful, despite the fact that some miners had cut off...Read More

Consumption of ferrous scrap in the United Kingdom will continue to increase over the coming years amid an expansion in the UK operations of international metals group Liberty House, Fastmarkets MB's research team believes. UK scrap demand in 2018 is on course to rise for the first time in four years after Liberty restarted a second electric arc furnace (EAF) at its site in Rotherham, northern Eng...Read More

It's been nine months since the United States announced Section 232 tariffs, and over six months since a 10% tax was applied to imports of aluminium from Canada, Mexico and the European Union. There's been a huge debate over how successful the tariffs - imposed on the grounds of national security and also applied at a 25% rate to steel - have been. Much depends on who you talk to, and what their s...Read More

Base metals trading fund Commodities World Capital has brought in Kevin Connors as its new chief executive officer, it said on Tuesday February 5. He will take on the role to allow founder and co-chief...Read More

Copper's three-month price on the London Metal Exchange continued its uptrend at the close of trading on Tuesday February 5, with moderate volumes and a surge in the US dollar index doing little to curb the metal's upward price movement, while the rest of the complex broadly consolidated.Climbing above $6,200 per tonne for the first time since October 2018, the three-month copper price continued t...Read More

Comex copper prices in the United States shrugged off earlier losses in morning trading on Tuesday February 5, with the base metals complex temporarily boosted by the lack of Chinese participation while the East Asian country begins its Lunar New Year holiday.The copper price for March settlement on the Comex division of the New York Mercantile Exchange rebounded by 2.20 cents on February 5 to $2....Read More

Base metals prices on the London Metal Exchange were mixed during morning trading on Tuesday February 5, with most metals consolidating gains made at Monday's close while low stocks and a weaker dollar fail to prompt upward price action. Across afternoon trading on Monday, nickel, zinc and lead futures rallied to reach fresh highs, with low liquidity due to the Chinese New Year holidays contributi...Read More

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

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

China's month-on-month new electric vehicles (NEV) sales rebounded in August after month-on-month declines in June and July. The drop in sales between May and June was the first drop since September 2016, but Fastmarkets MB had expected Chinese NEV sales to dip temporarily after the June subsidy changes came into effect because consumers and NEV manufacturers would have to adjust to the new subsid...Read More

Iron ore prices fell sharply in the second half of November after climbing through October, with prices for higher-grade material pioneering the decline.Fastmarkets MB daily benchmark for 65% Fe fines dropped by 22% by Monday November 26 after peaking on October 29. The 62% Fe iron ore index declined by 16% over the period, as some Chinese steelmakers started to seek larger volumes of cheaper ores...Read More

The steel scrap sector in the United States still depends on exports to Turkey, a member of the Fastmarkets research team said during the ferrous session at the Bureau of International Recycling (BIR) conference in London.This dependence persists despite the changes in the international markets created by the US' imposition of its Section 232 tariffs on imports of steel products, metals analyst Le...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

Flat steel import prices in the United Arab Emirates and Saudi Arabia have risen over the past week but demand has remained soft, sources told Fastmarkets on Tuesday February 5.Demand was subdued because stock levels in the UAE were already high and buyers wanted to see which direction prices would move after the Lunar New Year holiday in China, they added.UAEChina-origin HRC was on offer to the U...Read More