
LME aluminium stocks declined by more than half during the first nine months of 2026, falling by 267,875 tonnes from 509,250 tonnes on January 2 to 241,375 tonnes on September 30 (52.6 per cent). The decline continued throughout the period, with average warehouse inventories falling each month. Compared with the same period in 2025, monthly average stocks were lower across all nine months, with the gap widening in the third quarter. Q1 LME aluminium stocks fall 18.2 per cent LME aluminium inventories continued to decline during Q1 2026. Month-end stocks fell from 495,725 tonnes in January to 465,550 tonnes in February, before dropping further to 416,775 tonnes in March. Monthly average inventories stood at 498,670 tonnes in January, 481,801 tonnes in February and 440,710 tonnes in March....
The London Metal Exchange (LME) aluminium price chart reported declines on the November 10 trading session after a temporary surge at the November 9 close. Both near-term and longer-dated contracts posted over 1 per cent dip over the previous session. The LME aluminium cash bid as well as offer prices contracted 0.32 per cent day-on-day on November 10. The bid shifted from USD 3,145 per tonne to USD 3,135 per tonne. The offer price dipped from USD 3,147 per tonne to USD 3,137 per tonne. Explore- Most comprehensive and forward-looking industry-focused report — Global Bauxite & Alumina Market Forecast to 2036: Supply–Demand, Trade Flows & Price Outlook The LME aluminium three-month bid price reported a 1.11 per cent decline from USD 3,059 per tonne on November 9 to USD 3,025 per tonne on...
Grow with
AL Circle

“I don’t like aluminium.” That may seem an unlikely statement from the world’s sixth-largest producer of the metal. But Marius Kloppers, chief executive of BHP Billiton, is putting his money where his mouth is. BHP will from now on run its aluminium division for cash, he announced in February. Mr Kloppers can afford to dislike aluminium; the majority of his profits come from iron ore, oil and coal. But for the rest of the industry, his comments have sparked a debate: after a decade of sub-par profitability, is it still worth investing in aluminium? Right now, at least, the industry’s report card makes grim reading. Beyond BHP, which reported a pre-tax loss in aluminium in the six months to December 2011, Rusal, the world’s largest producer, saw a 72 per cent drop in profits from its...

Spot premium for imported primary aluminum ingot has risen to $130-135/mt plus London Metal Exchange cash CIF Japan Monday, the first change since March 14 when it stood at $122-127/mt, according to Platts data. No spot deal has been reported since contract negotiations for the second quarter ended in the week ending March 24. An overseas supplier offered $135/mt plus LME cash CIF Japan for ingot, but no buyer was said to have accepted. Japanese market participants said deals below $130/mt were unlikely as three major producers are not offering any spot cargoes for the next two months having already sold all their output for Q2. Meanwhile, spot buying interest remains thin in Japan. Two overseas supplier sources reported buying interest for 200-300 mt cargoes from Indonesia, Malaysia,...

National Aluminium Company Ltd (Nalco) has raised concern over provision for utilisation of 26 per cent profit earned by mining companies for affected people envisaged in the Mines & Minerals (Development & Regulation) Bill. It has stressed on developing a robust mechanism to ensure optimum utilisation of the periphery development fund where the 26 per cent profits made by miners would be parked. “Sharing 26% per cent of the profit is not a big issue. But scepticism is about the mechanism to use the fund for the purpose it is intended,” B L Bagra, chairman and managing director, Nalco said at a recent seminar organized by Policy Development Initiatives in New Delhi. "Unless a robust mechanism is put in place to ensure that the funds collected for the periphery development fund is used for...

Yunnan Aluminum Co., Ltd. released the 2011 annual report recently, saying its production of aluminum ingot and aluminum products were 537,300 mt in 2011, up 34,500 mt compared with 502,800 mt in 2010. Meanwhile, the report also reveals that the company will produce 650,000 mt of aluminum ingot and aluminum products in 2012, with operating income expected to reach RMB 9 billion. Yunnan Aluminum is actively building the electricity-bauxite-alumina-aluminum-aluminum processing industrial chain and speeding up the industrial layout. As Yunnan Wenshan Aluminum Company, a subsidiary of Yunnan Aluminum, put its 800,000 mt alumina project into operations, Yunnan Aluminum’s overall industrial chain will further complete, thereby well controlling its aluminum costs. According to the 2011...

Alcoa Inc. (AA) Chief Executive Officer Klaus Kleinfeld said in January China’s aluminum industry would cut 1.1 million metric tons of unprofitable capacity “pretty soon.” So far that prediction isn’t close to coming true. China’s aluminum industry, the world’s largest, saw output rise 18 percent in the first two months of the year, according to International Aluminum Association data. That’s helped to boost global supplies and create a surplus of the metal while curbing prices, which are down 22 percent from a year ago. Declining prices and rising energy costs have eroded smelting margins, prompting New York-based Alcoa and its Norwegian competitor Norsk Hydro ASA (NHY) to announce 771,000 metric tons of capacity cuts this year. China’s smelters are avoiding that fate because they don’t...

Viktor Vekselberg, the Russian billionaire, has filed a suit in London over an agreement by United Company Rusal to grant a long-term sales contract to global commodities trader Glencore, ratcheting up a battle with rival shareholder, Oleg Deripaska. The move takes the clash between Mr Vekselberg and Mr Deripaska to London’s Court of International Arbitration less than a month after Mr Vekselberg resigned as chairman of Rusal’s board, claiming management had dragged the aluminium producer into heavy indebtedness and “deep crisis”. According to a person close to one of Rusal’s shareholders, Sual Partners – the investment vehicle owned by Mr Vekselberg and his business partner Len Blavatnik – is taking legal action over two contracts worth $47bn to sell aluminium and alumina directly to...

Vedanta Aluminium Ltd (VAL), a unit of Anil Agarwal-led Vedanta Resources Plc, has sought the intervention of the Orissa government for securing long-term coal linkage for its captive power plant (CPP) at Jharsuguda. The aluminium major required the coal linkage for its unit-6 and unit-9 of 135 Mw each capacity to feed power to the 0.5 million tonne per annum aluminum smelter in Jharsuguda. "We request for your kind intervention and to take up the matter with the ministry of coal for re-allocation of coal linkage to our two units of 135 Mw each,” requested Pramod Suri, chief executive officer and whole-time director, VAL, in a letter to the state chief secretary B K Pattnaik. The Mahanadi Coalfields Limited (MCL), a subsidiary of Coal India, had denied signing the fuel supply assurance...

SUAL Partners is suing Oleg Deripaska's En+ Group and Glencore International, fellow shareholders in the world's biggest aluminum producer United Company RusAl, to overturn trading contracts, according to three people with knowledge of the matter. SUAL, controlled by Viktor Vekselberg and Len Blavatnik, accused En+ and Swiss trader Glencore in a London court of breaching a 2007 shareholder agreement for pushing through new contracts without its consent, said the people, who declined to be identified because the information is not public. The case was filed April 4. The lawsuit escalates a shareholder conflict over RusAl management's decision to hold on to 25 percent of Norilsk Nickel. Vekselberg quit as RusAl chairman last month, saying the company, where Deripaska is CEO, is facing a...

South Korea has bought a total of 3,000 tonnes of high-grade primary aluminium ingot registered on the London Metal Exchange (LME) via tenders closed on Wednesday, the state-run Public Procurement Service said on its website (www.g2b.go.kr). Details of the purchases are as follows: TONNES SUPPLIER PREMIUM(CIF/T) 2,000 Metal Park Corp $160.8 1,000 Glencore International AG $155 Note: The above premiums were made over the London Metal Exchange prices on a cost, insurance and freight (CIF) basis.

After finding ground at around Rs 53, National Aluminium Company Ltd (Nalco) jumped more than 11 per cent with good volumes in the previous week. This rally has breached the stock's immediate resistance at Rs 59 as well as its 21 and 50-day moving averages. However, the stock is currently testing its 200-day moving average at Rs 63. The daily relative strength index is on the brink of entering the bullish zone from the neutral region and the weekly RSI is inching higher in the neutral region. Both daily and weekly price rate of change indicators are featuring in the positive terrain implying buying interest. Strong up move above Rs 63 will push the stock higher to Rs 67 and then to Rs 71 in the short-term. Only an emphatic rally above Rs 71 will reinforce the stock's medium-term uptrend...

World aluminium demand is increasing by six per cent per annum from 40 million tonnes to over 70 million tonnes by the year 2020. The ‘big five’ Gulf smelters - Alba, Dubal, Emal, Sohar and Qatalum – recorded significant developments and achievements last year, with 3.6 million tonnes of aluminium produced in 2011. Gulf Production is expected to increase to five million tonnes by the end of 2014, when the Emal Phase II expansion and other smelter projects are completed. Emirates Aluminium (Emal) will host the exclusive second annual Gulf Aluminium Dinner 2012 on April 29th at the Emirates Palace hotel. The Gulf Aluminium Council (GAC) dinner event will provide an unparalleled networking platform for the world’s top aluminium industry leaders, and help to continue the momentum of the...

Lower supplies from Mahanadi Coalfields affected primary metal production of National Aluminium Co (Nalco) last fiscal. Aluminium output dropped in 2011-12 to 4.13 lakh tonnes against 4.44 lakh tonnes in the previous financial year. The energy-intensive aluminium production at Nalco's Odisha facilities fell as annual power generation declined to 6,200 million units from the previous year's 6,608 million units. “Power generation and consequently metal production were down owing to lower than contractually linked supply of coal, forcing us to shut down 10 per cent of our smelting capacity,” Mr B.L. Bagra, CMD, Nalco, told Business Line. Mahanadi is mandated to supply 48 lakh tonnes of thermal coal to Nalco a year. “Till the end of December last year, the coal supply backlog was significant...

Tajikistan's state-owned aluminium smelter, the largest in Central Asia, reduced output by 14.2 percent year-on-year in the first quarter of 2012 to 73,362 tonnes, a source close to the company's management said on Friday. Tajikistan Aluminium Company, known as TALCO, plans to produce 332,500 tonnes of primary aluminium this year. It produced 377,584 tonnes in 2011, down 20.4 percent from the total the year before. Aluminium exports account for more than a half of Tajikistan's entire export revenues. The country is the poorest of the 15 former Soviet nations. Ex-Soviet neighbour Uzbekistan, which is the sole natural gas exporter to Tajikistan, halted its supplies of the fuel on April 1, after saying its three-month contract with Dushanbe had expired and it needed to fill a gas pipeline...

The share price of one of Russia’s biggest companies, aluminum producer Rusal, dropped slightly on Friday following media reports that billionaire Viktor Vekselberg’s investment firm had launched a lawsuit against it. A source close to Vekselberg confirmed to the Prime Tass news agency on Friday that Vekselberg’s Sual Partners, which owns a minority stake in Rusal, was suing the aluminum giant in London over a long-term contract the company signed with mining company Glencore in December. Sual, which is co-owned by Vekselberg and his partner Lev Blavatnkik, are claiming that a $47 billion supply deal signed between Rusal and Glencore was agreed in violation of Sual’s right to veto. “The contract with Glencore stipulates the supply of 1.4 million tons of aluminum in 2012 – 30 percent of...

Alu1 recently delivered a Power and Free scale to Rio Tinto Alcan’s site at Ísal, Iceland. The scale is used to track carbon consumption in aluminium smelters. This particular configuration of scale weighs the anode rod before and after the carbon is stripped off in the Butt Removal Press. The weight of carbon stripped off is then calculated as the difference between the two values. This scale is configured to be installed directly above the Butt Removal Press. The scale consists of in-house designed weighing cells, weighing head (Computer) and junction boxes. The weighing cells are made to withstand significant forces from the Butt Removal Press and resist the dusty environment in the rodding room. Even though a section of the Power and Free track had to be modified, the installation...

A warehouse company owned by commodity trader Glencore (GLEN.L) is rapidly expanding its lucrative storage facilities at a Dutch port that has become a hub for storing aluminium, a metal increasingly used by bankers and traders as a financing tool. The move in warehousing comes as banks and trading houses face increased scrutiny for speculating on commodity prices while at the same time owning sheds that store a fundamental driver of price - metal stocks. "Really a lot of warehouses have been added in one year. The biggest expansion is in aluminium (but) steel has also been growing a lot," Marcel Pater, commercial manager at Zeeland Seaports, which operates the Dutch ports of Vlissingen and Terneuzen, said in an interview. He confirmed the new sheds were registered with the London Metal...

Aluminum posted its sixth straight session of losses. The tone turned negative early in Wednesday's London Metal Exchange session following the release of Federal Open Market Committee minutes late Tuesday that removed hopes of imminent U.S. monetary easing, Triland Metals says. "However the mood worsened in the afternoon following what was seen as a weak Spanish auction that ended up increasing the yields in most of southern European economies, a fresh blow for the euro," Triland says. "Even fair ADP job numbers from the U.S. did little…Activity could well pick up tomorrow as many will be looking to square their position ahead of the long (Easter) weekend. " LME three-months aluminum closed down $32 to $2,087.50 an ounce. LME copper, nickel, zinc, Lead and Tin also finished lower.

Matt Aboud, Tony Farraj & Tom Walpole Will Join the Association's Board of Directors The Aluminum Association elected three new members to its Board of Directors. Matt Aboud, Vice-President and Managing Director of Hydro Aluminum's Metal Markets in North America, Anthony Farraj, Commercial Vice-President of Global Packaging for Alcoa Global Rolled Products and Tom Walpole, Senior Vice-President of Novelis and President of Novelis North America will join the Association's Board of Directors. "Matt, Tony and Tom have diverse experience and expertise in critical areas of the U.S., North American and global aluminum industry," said Tom Brackmann, President of Nichols Aluminum and Chairman of the Aluminum Association's Board of Directors. "They will be a vital part of leading the Association...