Improved orders grow operating rates at zinc die-casting producers in Apr

Operating rates across major aluminium processors decreased 1.8 percentage points from a week ago to 70.7% last week. The main reason is that the power load in Henan is too high, prompting the province to impose staggered power use, affecting production at local aluminium plate, strip, foil and wire & cable producers.

Operating rates across lead-acid battery producers in Jiangsu, Zhejiang, Jiangxi, Hubei and Hebei provinces gained 0.4 percentage point from July 9 to 69.41% as of Friday July 16.

This is a roundup of China's metals weekly inventory as of July 2.

It has been more than 3 months after China is hit by the COVID-19 pandemic, and restrictions on industrial activities and transportation were the harshest in February. During this period, SMM is continuously tracking market recovery on the metals market. Please see our detailed findings for the nonferrous metals sector below. We will keep you posted on the latest happenings via our website www.metal.com and our social media channels on Linkedin and Twitter. Please register for our webinars in March as we continue to connect you with the latest happening in the China ferrous and nonferrous metals market. The next session is happening on Wednesday March 18, 5pm CST, where we present to you a macro update of the resumption of metals industry as China recovers gradually from COVID-19 , with a deep-dive in the ferrous metals markets.

Operating rates across Jiangsu, Zhejiang, Jiangxi, Hubei and Hebei averaged 55.21% in the week ended January 3

Orders shrank in a traditional low season for end-users, while high temperature disrupted production

Rates averaged 46.32%, down 0.82 percentage point from May and 2.32 percentage points from Jun 2018

It gained 0.64 percentage point from the previous week and averaged 51.91% in the week through May 24

Operating rates averaged 66.98% in Apr, down 4.27 percentage points from Mar and 7.12 percentage points from Apr 2018

Rates inched up 0.69 percentage points from the previous week and averaged 55.55% in the week through Apr 12