SHANGHAI, Jul 13 (SMM) – Zinc social inventory in Shanghai, Guangdong and Tianjin fell further over the week ended Friday July 13 on limited arrivals and growing shipments leaving warehouses, SMM research found.

The inventory decreased over 10,000 mt from Monday to 99,300 mt as of July 13 with lower stocks across all three regions.

As futures prices tumbled earlier this week, smelters held back from selling but downstream consumers stockpiled at low prices. In addition, many smelters chose to undertake maintenance in July, which shrank the arrivals in the market.

We expect inventories to inch up next week in anticipation of inflows of imported materials as the import window temporarily opened this week. Downstream consumers have also stockpiled this week.