Feb aluminium foil exports grow 0.7% YoY

Operating rates across major aluminium processors rose slightly last week as they had to accept high aluminium prices to deliver orders. End-users find it difficult to accept current high aluminium prices. As some end-users adopt quarterly or semi-annual pricing, high aluminium prices will not pass through to end-users until they complete Q2 pricing.

China exported 1.23 million mt of aluminium foil in 2020, down 4.95% on the year, according to customs data.

China exported 30,000 mt of alumina in January-February, down 82.7% from the same period a year ago, showed that latest data from the China Customs. Separately, China’s exports of unwrought aluminium and aluminium semi products came in at 669,208 mt in the first two months of the year, down 25.3% from a year earlier.

SMM estimates that there were 90 vessels carrying 12.01 million mt of iron ore arrived at major Chinese ports during March 8-14, up 400,000 mt from the week ended March 7 and up 1.6 million mt from the same period a year earlier. Arrivals in China’s steelmaking hub Tangshan increased on the week. 

On a monthly basis, however, aluminium foil exports edged up 1.87% last month

Operating rate fell 4.77 percentage points from Jun to 83.06% in Jul

However, H1 exports hit a record high of 670,300 mt, up 8% from Jan-Jun of 2018

Exports stood at 125,000 mt in May, up 21.57% on the month after a decline of 18.07% in Apr

Customs data showed that only 3.98% of Chinese exports of aluminium foil entered Mexico in 2018

Fifty-seven vessels carrying 8.43 million mt of iron ore are expected to arrive at major Chinese ports in the week ended Jan 31