China, the world’s top exporter of aluminium, turned net importer for the first time in July 2020 since 2009. On a year-on-year basis, the country’s imports in July increased seven-fold to record the second-highest level, according to the China customs data. In August, the imports of unwrought aluminium alloy continued to hike year-on-year by 810 per cent, but decreased from the month earlier by 15 per cent to come in at 146,000 tonnes.
Arrivals of unwrought aluminium and aluminium products into China came in at 391,297 tonnes in July, higher from the exports of 373,402.3 tonnes in the same month.
The surge in China’s July aluminium imports came amid a wide disparity between domestic aluminium prices, as demand rapidly recovered since the outbreak of the COVID-19 earlier this year, and lower international prices on the London Metal Exchange.
In August also China’s unwrought aluminium alloy imports stood higher than the exports of 16,000 tonnes. The exports increased month-on-month by 73.6 per cent but decreased year-on-year by 61.5 per cent.
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