Downstream Demand Dominates Lead Price, Not Environmental Checks, SMM Reports

SHANGHAI, Jul. 20 (SMM) – Recent environmental protection inspections had little impact on primary lead and large secondary lead smelters with environmental permits, but affected small secondary lead smelters greatly, SMM says. Small secondary lead smelters in Henan, Hebei, Shandong, Anhui, Jiangxi and Guangdong closed down.

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However, this made small ripples in lead price, which was still dominated by sluggish downstream demand.

In other news, secondary lead replacement of primary lead has reached 40% in 2016 and will grow to 50% in 2017, SMM notes. Compared to primary lead, secondary lead has lower cost and ample raw material supply. As such, secondary lead replacement of primary lead will be a tendency in a long term.

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