Russian May Palladium shipments to Switzerland spike for second straight month

RUSSIA June 25 2014 12:43 PM

MOSCOW (Scrap Register): Russian palladium shipments to Switzerland spiked for the second straight month in May but Barclays looks for the amount of metal coming out of Russia to keep trending lower.

Analysts tend to monitor Swiss trade data for PGM shipments, with much of Russia’s PGMs thought to move through Switzerland. Russian palladium shipments into Switzerland in May were some 49,300 ounces after around 69,400 in April.

Shipments in the first quarter were around the 6,500-ounce monthly trend of recent years before a two-month spike to start the second quarter.

Overall, Barclays continues to expect limited releases from Russian state stocks this year and reiterate their expectation for the palladium market to deliver a sizable deficit in 2014.

Each of four large spikes since the beginning of 2013 has become successfully smaller. In fact, the combined April-May total is less than spikes last year of 156,000 to 292,000 ounces.