China’s aluminium production in June 2023 (30 calendar days) stood at 3.37 million tonnes, reflecting a drop of 2.94 per cent M-o-M from 3.472 million tonnes, found the Shanghai Metals Market survey. However, on a year-on-year calculation, the output in June 2023 edged a marginal rise of 0.14 per cent, showed SMM.
The share of liquid aluminium output dropped 3.5 percentage points M-o-M to 72 per cent in June as aluminium smelters cut the share of liquid aluminium output in response to poor demand.
The domestic daily average aluminium production in June stood steady M-o-M at 112,200 tonnes despite a fall in monthly production.
SMM data also showed the total domestic production in the first six months of the year (H1) amounted to 20.11 million tonnes, up by 2.81 per cent year-on-year.
Operating capacity in Yunnan grew M-o-M in June with the addition of 260,000 tonnes, driven by production resumption in June-end. In Guizhou, 120,000 tonnes of new aluminium capacity was added after a local smelter completed equipment upgrading. On the other hand, operating capacity in Shandong fell by 250,000 tonnes due to capacity transfer.
According to SMM, as of July 7, the installed aluminium capacity in China was about 45.19 million tonnes, with an operating capacity of 41.073 million tonnes. The domestic capacity is expected to grow in July, owing to the resumption of 4.194 million kilowatts of power load for local smelters in Yunnan, which is likely to lead to higher output. SMM estimates more than 800,000 tonnes of aluminium capacity in Yunnan will be resumed in July.
China’s total domestic operating aluminium capacity is expected to exceed 41.8 million tonnes by the end of July. Output is estimated to reach 3.55 million tonnes in the said month (31 calendar days). SMM predicts aluminium inventories to climb to around 600,000 tonnes at the end of July 2023.
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