[31 October SMM Zinc data]

As of April 15 Friday, SMM China copper inventory across major markets in China added 4,000 mt from Monday April 11 to 139,300 mt, down slightly by 1,000 mt from last Friday. The weekly inventory dropped again after a short increase last week. Compared with the domestic inventory recorded on Monday, the local stocks all added except for Shanghai during this period.

As of Friday, April 8, SMM copper inventory across mainstream regions in the country achieved the first weekly rise since March 4, with an increase of 3400 mt to 140300 mt compared with Wednesday April 6, and a slight increase of 2600 mt compared with last Friday.

The social inventory of lead ingots across Shanghai, Guangdong, Zhejiang, Jiangsu and Tianjin dropped 3,200 mt from Friday March 11 and rose 9,800 mt from Monday March 7 to 119,000 mt as of March 14.

China's refined zinc output stood at 458,400 mt in February, down 59,200 mt or 11.43% MoM and 2.72% YoY.

China produced 2.95 million mt of aluminium in February (28 days), down 2.35% on the year. The daily output averaged 105,000 mt, up 1,900 mt/day on the month.

Domestic copper cathode output in February stood at 835,700 mt, up 2.1% month-on-month (MoM) and 1.7% year-on-year (YoY).

China’s output of praseodymium-neodymium (PrNd) oxide in February 2022 stood at 6,094 mt, down 2.5% from a year earlier with ion-absorbed iron separation companies in Sichuang, Jiangus, Guangdong and Guangxi contributing most of the increment, while those in Jiangxi saw output cuts.

Intraday carbonate lithium prices recorded high ahead of the Chinese New Year holiday. The supply side was affected by the shutdown and maintenance of the upstream lithium salt manufacturers and the production reduction of the brine lake.

The SHFE nickel continued to rise strongly last week, as the LME and SHFE inventories both dropped to extremely low levels and are expected to keep falling.

The most active SHFE 2203 copper contract prices are expected to move between 69,900-72,000/mt this week, and LME copper will trade between $9,750-10,050/mt.