Commodities » Industrial Metals

Industrial metals (copper, aluminium, nickel, etc.) daily review (March 18, 2010)

Contributed by Nirmal Bang

By Nirmal Bang

MARKET ROUNDUP

Industrial metals maintained momentum near one-week highs late Wednesday, buoyed by falling inventories, talk of a Chinese yuan revaluation and improved economic sentiment from a U.S. Federal Reserve pledge to keep interest rates low for some time. Nickel and Copper in particualr traded strong in last trading session.

IN FOCUS

- The global copper market recorded an 86,900 tonne surplus in January, the World Bureau of Metal Statistics (WMBS) said on Wednesday.

- The global aluminium market was in a 156,000 tonne surplus in January, down from 309,000 tonnes in the same month last year. In 2009, primary aluminium production outpaced consumption by 580,000 tonnes.

- WBMS said the zinc market was in surplus by 119,000 tonnes in January 2010, compared with a 386,000 tonne surplus for the whole of 2009.

- The lead market was in a 5,000 tonne deficit in January, with surpluses of 15,500 tonnes and 500 tonnes for nickel and tin respectively, according to WBMS.

- Swedish miner and smelter Boliden said on Wednesday it would shut a copper smeltworks and refinery in Finland later this week as a strike by port workers was hitting concentrate supplies.

- Top global miner BHP Billiton said on Wednesday nickel production at its Kwinana nickel refinery in Western Australia had been "interrupted". The Kwinana refinery has a capacity of approximately 65,000 tonnes per year of nickel metal, according to the BHP Website.

- Yang Zhiqiang, president of China's Gansu Province-based Jinchuan Group, stated that the company plans to produce 130000 mt of nickel and 6,000 mt of cobalt in 2010, almost the same as the 2009 output levels.

- Tongling Nonferrous 000630.SZ is building a 400,000 tonne copper plant that will up its capacity by half by 2012, a company executive said on Wednesday. The smelter in Anhui province will boost the firm's refined copper production capacity to 1.2million tonnes a year, he said, making Tongling the top producer in China, the world's largest copper consumer.

FUNDAMENTAL OUTLOOK

Industrial metal are trading a tad higher on international bourses. Outlook for industrial metals is sideways to down for the day on the back of some credit tightening fears from China. Copper in particular looks weak for the day selling on rise is recommended.