Spot Copper Concentrate TCs Hit a New High, and the Supply is Expected to be Sufficient in the Fourth Quarter

SHANGHAI, Sep 28 (SMM) - CSPT held the fourth quarter general manager's office meeting online on the morning of September 27, which nailed the TCs of spot copper concentrate in the fourth quarter at $93/mt and $0.093/lb, $13/mt higher than that of the third quarter, creating a new high since the fourth quarter of 2017.
The SMM Imported Copper Concentrate Index rose from $77.83/mt on April 1 to $84.35/mt on September 23, which also confirmed the abundant supply of spot copper concentrate in the third quarter of 2022. The fast-rising guidance TCs of spot copper concentrate extends Chinese smelters’ optimistic expectations of raw material supply in the fourth quarter based on the sufficient raw materials in the third quarter.
 In 2022, various factors cast different impacts on both the supply and demand sides of copper concentrate, and the disruption on the demand side was much deeper. Mine production was hindered to varying degrees by the decline in ore grades of mainstream mines in South America, the community protests against Las Bambas production, and the increasingly stringent environmental protection policies in South America. In the spot market, the inflow of raw materials to the Chinese and South Korean markets that caused by the production accident at the Saganoseki smelter in Japan in January 2022, Shandong Xiangguang’s production suspension and the dumping of raw materials in March, the reselling of copper concentrate at Qinhuangdao port in August, and the recent production problems of South Korean LS-Nikko smelter led to an unexpected increase in the spot copper concentrate supply in Chinese markets. On the demand side, due to the continuous delay of the new projects of Daye Yangxin Hongsheng and the expansion projects of North Copper, the centralised maintenance of Chinese smelters in the second and third quarters and China's power cuts cast negative impacts on the copper smelting.  

In 2022, the negative impact of unexpected disruptions on smelters is greater than that on the mines, thus the TCs of spot copper concentrates edged higher.