SMM Daily Review - 2012/3/12 Tin Market

SHANGHAI, Mar. 13 (SMM) – Spot tin prices failed to continue the late rally in Shanghai on Monday, as light LME tin trading following a much lower opening and weak demand caused the wait-and-see sentiment to reshape. Supply stayed limited with smelters little interested in such prices. Nanshan, Feidie and Yunxiang struck deals between RMB 170,500-171,000/mt while Yunxi and Yunheng concluded transactions between RMB 171,500-172,000/mt.

In an SMM survey on this week’s tin prices, 60% of market players covered expect stability as Greek debt swap results and US non-farm payroll data were already released while no risk-generating events will appear this week. In addition, they said LME tin seems has exhausted its momentum from late good news based on its rather flat performance on Monday. As such LME tin will provide limited support for domestic tin prices. That, together with a still weak demand, means domestic tin prices won’t change much this week. Another 20% respondents said domestic tin prices will climb expecting LME tin to rally further. Remaining 20% are pessimistic respondents who say losses may show if LME tin fails to present large gains as last Friday’s stock replenishments are a “flash in the pan” and demand remains weak.