Aluminium prices came under renewed pressure on October 1 as expectations of improving supply, stronger Chinese exports and a firmer USD weighed on the market. Aluminium settled 0.73 per cent lower at INR 340.65, while expectations of tighter US monetary policy added to the broader macroeconomic pressure. The decline comes as several aluminium smelters prepare to restart previously idled capacity, while others move ahead with expansion plans. These developments are raising expectations that global aluminium availability could improve in the coming months. China exports add to supply pressure China is emerging as another important factor for the aluminium market. Rising exports are partly offsetting supply disruptions in the Gulf, with August aluminium exports increasing 17.2 per cent...
According to SMM statistics, on September 30, aluminium billet inventory in major consuming regions in China stood at 149,500 tonnes, up 500 tonnes WoW from last Thursday and down 5,000 tonnes from this Monday, with inventory consolidating at highs and basically flat overall. On a year-over-year basis, inventory was about 35,000 tonnes higher than the same period in 2025 and about 41,000 tonnes higher than the same period in 2024, with total inventory still at the highest level for the same period in the past four years. From the perspective of warehouse withdrawals, aluminium billet withdrawals from September 21 to September 28 totalled 44,800 tonnes, holding near 45,000 tonnes for two consecutive weeks. By region, Foshan inventory stood at 69,500 tonnes, down 3,000 tonnes from last...
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The average cash cost at Chinese aluminum smelters fell another 2.55% month-on-month in June , driven by lower alumina and power costs, SMM survey showed. Some smelters have received preferential power tariffs due to China’s power reform, cutting the average power cost by 4.55%. Alumina cost fell 1.59%. Prebaked anode cost held largely stable, while fluoride salt cost rose 4.97% from a month ago.
The outlook for aluminium is looking severely pressured for the next few years as excess capacity in China shows no sign of easing, resulting in a more downbeat outlook for Australian-listed miners Rio Tinto, South32 and Alumina. Last week, Macquarie took the knife to its aluminium price forecasts to the end of the decade, while Macquarie and UBS cut their forecasts for alumina, the main ingredient in aluminium. “Unlike most commodities, aluminium supply continues to grow at a rapid pace,” Macquarie said in a note to clients. “With Chinese exports now likely to play a sustained and growing role in the global market in future years, the whole market has been radically altered.” Macquarie slashed its 2016 to 2020 forecasts by 10 to 20 per cent and is not expecting prices (now at near...
LME aluminum will rebound to $ 1,710-1,750 per tonne next week, Shanghai Metals Market foresees. KDJ and MACD indicators have sent positive signals. Greek debt crisis has eased. A poll before the referendum showed that there is a good chance for Greece to stay in the euro zone. These will offer rising impetus to LME aluminum. Spot discounts in China’s spot aluminum market should narrow to 50-100 yuan per tonne over SHFE front-month contract. This is because nearing delivery date of SHFE 1507 aluminum contract will allow sellers to hold back goods at lows.
Aluminium ingots and sow ingots are being sent in a huge quantity as break bulk cargo to the United States. The ingots so far were being sent to various destinations through containers by all the aluminium manufacturers. Hindalco Industries Ltd, the metal’s flagship company of Aditya Birla Group, the world’s largest aluminium rolling company, became the first aluminium manufacturer to export from Visakhapatnam Port 15,034 tons of ingots as break bulk cargo or general cargo by engaging Orissa Stevedores Ltd (OSL). The loading of the cargo into bulk carrier CS Crystal berthed at WQ-6 of Multiport Pvt. Ltd. terminal was completed on Sunday. The ship is scheduled to leave for the discharge port at New Orleans in the US on Monday. The cargo was brought here from Hindalco plants at Mahan,...
Press Metal Bhd’s (Press Metal) capacity expansion of its Samalaju plant in Bintulu has been viewed positively by analysts as the expansion will likely translate into superior earnings growth in the financial year 2016 (FY16). Following a visit to the plant, Kenanga Investment Bank Bhd’s research team (Kenanga Research) was positive on the progress of the expansion and it believed that Phase 2 of the Samalaju plant would be fully operational by end of the third quarter of 2015 (3Q15), while Phase 3 is expected commence operations by end-4Q15. While its Phase 2 Samalaju smelting plant was shut down temporarily earlier this year due to a fire incident, the research team noted that about 15 per cent of the smelting pots are already up and running. “Although the remaining pots are still under...
Chinese aluminium smelters will be forced to reduce production levels because they cannot continue to operate with such low global market prices, according to the world's largest aluminium producer. Chinese smelters "expected the price to recover but it's already [been] more than six months. The price is very low and these producers are suffering from losses, so they have to start shutting down," said Oleg Mukhamedshin, deputy chief executive of United Rusal Co., in an interview this week. Chinese producers of aluminium have been criticised for pumping out vast quantities of the metal even though prices have plunged 6 per cent since the beginning of the year, and have been hovering near six-year lows in recent weeks. Critics such as Rusal say a range of government subsidies keep...
Japan's aluminium premiums for July-September shipments were mostly set at a six-year low of $100 as swelling Chinese exports piled more pressure on an already swamped market, five sources directly involved in the talks said. The nearly $300 quarterly drop in premiums, the sharpest such decline ever, is in line with a global slump triggered by higher aluminium supply after the London Metal Exchange (LME) forced warehousing companies to shorten delivery times. "Japan has been particularly hit by the global collapse in premiums as China's export of aluminium products to elsewhere in Asia pushed ingots to Japan," a trader said. Japan is Asia's top importer of the metal and the premiums for primary metal shipments it agrees to pay each quarter over the LME cash price set the benchmark for the...
The Slatina-based plant was built 50 years ago and, all this time, has produced over 9.5 M tons of aluminium. The highest production was recorded in 2008 - 265,000 tons of primary aluminium. The crisis caused a notable decrease of production, but, in the last 2-3 years, the company has managed to stabilise its production at a rate of almost 200,000 tons. According to Gheorghe Dobra, CEO of the company, Alro will continue the modernisation of operations, with a budget of USD 59 M for 2015. The effort is aimed at growing the cost-effectiveness of the unit and its recycling capacities, while also expanding the range of products. In the last ten years, as a result of investment worth over USD 500 M, of which 100 M in environment protection features, the company ahs upgraded its equipment...
South32 Limited has appointed Dr Xolani Mkhwanazi to seve as the Company’s new Non-Executive Director with effect from 02 July 2015. Dr Mkhwanazi has been serving as Chairman of BHP Billiton Limited’s South Africa operations since October 2008. He serves also, as the President and Chief Operations Officer of BHP Billiton’s aluminium smelters Hillside, Bayside and Mozal. South32 is a JSE, LSE and ASX listed metals and mining company with bauxite, alumina, aluminium, thermal and metallurgical coal, manganese, nickel, silver, lead and zinc operations in South Africa.
AIM listed firms Imperial Innovations and Mercia Technologies have together provided £4m to aluminium business Impression Technologies. The duo invested £2.5m and £1.5m respectively in the firm which makes aluminium components for the transport sector. The investment brings Imperial Innovation’s stake to 59.9% of issued share capital, while in a statement Mercia said it would control 26% of the company when its stake through third party funds is included. The funding would be used to acquire a press, continue development and keep up with customer demand, Impression Technologies said in a statement. Imperial Innovations chief executive Russ Cummings said Impression Technologies was doing demonstration pressings for a number of high profile car manufacturers, and a key challenge was access...
A partnership between a Chinese and an Icelandic company has been struck to build an aluminium smelter in north Iceland. Kjarninn reports that Klappir Development ehf. and China Nonferrous Metal Industry’s Foreign Engineering and Construction (NFC) have signed an agreement to build a smelter in Hafursstaðir, in Skagabyggð, north Iceland. The smelter will be capable of producing 120,000 tonnes of aluminium every year, if completed. Prime Minister Sigmundur Davíð Gunnlaugsson and Chinese ambassador to Iceland Zhang Weidong were present at the signing, which took place at the Ministerial House in Reykjavík. A statement from the two companies says that they plan to cooperate in both the funding and managing of the smelter. The total cost of construction is estimated to be about 100 billion...
The power supply contract deadline that could see New Zealand Aluminium Smelters close is looming but a report from the smelter shows it was still investing capital and upping production. Despite this, industry analysts are still not confident of the outcome as aluminium prices had fallen from more than US$2000 a tonne late last year to about US$1700 this month, around one-year lows. The NZAS 2014 sustainable development report shows the Tiwai Pt smelter increased production of aluminium by 3500 tonnes since 2013. However, this still fell short of the 5000 extra tons smelter bosses had projected because fewer potlines had been operating. Under a contract with Meridian Energy, NZAS has the option to terminate its power deal on July 1 2015, with effect from January 1, 2017, or to reduce the...
Aluminium prices eased by 0.32 per cent to INR 108.90 per kg in futures trade today as speculators reduced positions amid weak demand at the spot market. At the Multi Commodity Exchange, aluminium for delivery in July traded lower by 35 paise, or 0.32 per cent, to INR 108.90 per kg in a business turnover of 260 lots. Likewise, the metal for delivery in August month shed 25 paise, or 0.23 per cent, to INR 110.45 per kg in 34 lots. Analysts said offloading of positions by speculators due to sluggish demand at spot market mainly weighed on aluminium prices but a higher trend in base metals overseas, limited the losses. INR 63.54 = 1 $ (Dollar)
Shares in South32, the diversified miner spun out of BHP Billiton, have dropped 17.3% in the past six weeks as the prices of its key commodities have weakened. The shares were trading at R16.74 on Wednesday compared with their close of R20.24 on the first day that South32 became a separate entity. In the same period, BHP Billiton’s shares have shed 11% to around R243. BHP Billiton shareholders received South32 shares on a one-for-one basis and it was expected that some shareholders would sell South32 to rebalance their portfolios. The share price drops show that continued weakness in commodity prices has also played a role in selling. South32 took over all BHP Billiton’s South African assets, including thermal coal mines, aluminium smelters, manganese mines and ferromanganese processing....
Base metals edged higher on Wednesday on hopes that demand would recover in China and that Greece would eventually agree a bailout with creditors. There was also some buying by investors who took profits from short positions over the past two days when some metals hit multi-year lows and others who saw the low prices as good value. Metals joined euro zone stocks and peripheral bonds in climbing after a report that Greece was ready to accept most conditions from its international creditors. "There's a recognition that even in the worst scenario, if Greece leaves the euro zone, it's not necessarily going to have a deep negative impact on global growth, which is ultimately what commodities are interested in," said Caroline Bain, senior commodities economist at Capital Economics. Three-month...
UC RUSAL, a leading global aluminium producer, announces the appointment of Christophe (Chris) Hoet as Director of Asian Sales. Chris Hoet joins RUSAL following a similar role within Vale, where he was Regional Director Sales & Marketing Base Metals, Asia Pacific. At RUSAL, he will be responsible for leading and developing the Company’s Asian sales portfolio, reporting to Steve Hodgson, RUSAL’s Sales & Marketing Director. Chris will replace Geoff Watson, who is retiring from RUSAL after nearly 5 years in this role. ‘Asia represents a strategically important market for RUSAL and Chris’s appointment continues our commitment to building enduring partnerships in the region, founded on the strong technical and commercial capabilities established under Geoff’s leadership’ Steve Hodgson, RUSAL’s...
Vedanta Resources Plc will today host its first Sustainable Development Day in London. As part of the Group's ongoing commitment to safety and sustainability as a key business imperative, Vedanta is hosting this event to explain how it is embedding sustainability across its operations and to provide an update on progress in the past year. Tom Albanese, Chief Executive Officer, and other senior management will be presenting. The presentations from the event and the Group's 2014-2015 Sustainable Development Report will be available on our Vedanta website.
Aluminium settled down -0.47% at INR 105.65 on the possibility of a Grexit increased, allowing market panic to grow. Also pressure seen after China imported 6,738 mt of primary aluminum in May, down 71.98% YoY, customs data showed. Also pressure seen after last ditch Greek debt negotiations broke down over the weekend, bringing the country a step closer to a debt default ahead of a looming deadline for a repayment to the International Monetary Fund on Tuesday. Despite the deposit reserve ratio and interest rate cut by the PBOC, CSI 500, IH 50 and IF 300 indexes plummeted as a large number of financiers closed positions, though clawed back some losses at the end of trading. This depressed market confidence. The China Securities Regulatory Commission (CSRC) expects to ease market panic. The...
