China Customs data found that yuan’s depreciation, as well as trade uncertainty in the overseas market demand, prompted firms to rush out shipments and drove up unwrought aluminium and aluminium products exports in November 2018.
Per the data, China exported 536,000 tonnes of unwrought aluminium and aluminium products in November, up some 54,000 tonnes from October. This means China’s unwrought aluminium and aluminium products exports in October stood at 482,000 tonnes. Hence, China’s November aluminium exports registered a growth of 11 per cent month-on-month.
{alcircleadd}This month-on-month increase in exports of aluminium came after three consecutive months of declines.
In the same period last year, China had exported around 316,204 tonnes of aluminium, which means this year in November, the country witnessed a rise of 41.1 per cent year-on-year. This brought the tally in January-November up 20.2 per cent earlier to stand at 5.28 million tonnes.
Overall, the aluminium exports by China are on a rising trend this year with interim drops, as shown by the Customs data. The year started with 445,000 tonnes of exports, up 14.3 per cent Y-o-Y. In the next month, the exports dropped by some 16 per cent and stood at 372,000 tonnes. So, the total aluminium exports volume by China during January-February 2018 was at 817,000 tonnes.
But in April, China’s exports rebounded and stood at 451,000 tonnes, which in the next month rose further to 485,000 tonnes, the then highest since December 2014. So, the total aluminium exports volume by China during April-May was at 936,000 tonnes, up 15 per cent from Jan-Feb 2018.
During October-November 2018, China’s total aluminium exports were at 1 million tonnes, up 25 per cent from January-February 2018 and 9 per cent from April-May 2018.
Paul Adkins, Managing Director of consultancy AZ China, had said then, the country’s aluminium exports were holding up “against the odds,” amid the US import tariffs on Chinese products.
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