Lead Ingot Social Inventory Down 5,800 mt over Weekend

SHANGHAI, Oct 18 (SMM) – The social inventory of lead ingots across Shanghai, Guangdong, Zhejiang, Jiangsu and Tianjin decreased 5,800 mt from Friday October 15 and fell 12,600 mt from last Monday October 11 to 193,900 mt as of October 18.

According to SMM research, the power rationing and maintenance sustained across primary and secondary lead smelters. Among them, the production is Anhui was partly suspended temporarily due to maintenance of power lines. While the smelters in Henan received a new power rationing notice, reducing the power consumption by around to 20% based on initial estimate. The profits of secondary lead expanded last week, and the smelters resumed the production as expected. However, the actual supply has still been limited. Therefore, the social inventories of lead ingots continued to fall.

Going forward, the market shall watch how the power rationing policy evolves in Henan and Anhui, and see if the resuming production of secondary lead smelters will make changes to the social inventory of lead ingots.