SHANGHAI, Jan 3 (SMM) - As of Tuesday January 3, 2023, SMM copper inventory across major Chinese markets stood at 109,300 mt, up 11,300 mt from last Friday and 14,400 mt from the same period last year when the data was 94,900 mt. Shipment ramp-up of smelters at the year-end and the poor consumption contributed to the continuous increase in inventories. Inventories in all regions of China rose during the New Year's Day holiday. In detail, the inventory in Shanghai rose 3,300 mt to 71,900 mt, the inventory in Guangdong added 4,000 mt to 9,300 mt, the inventory in Jiangsu gained 3,800 mt to 21,400 mt, the inventory in Chongqing grew 100 mt to 500 mt, and the inventoty in Tianjin increased 100 mt to 1,600 mt.

COVID-19 still affected the production of processing enterprises. In some regions, production of companies grow with more workers who caught the COVID-19 virus returning to work, while in most areas, the operating rates of enterprises remain low as the number of COVID-19-infected people has not reached its peak. In addition, as the Chinese New Year holiday is getting closer, some terminal enterprises have begun their holidays and reduced the production, which further pushed up the social inventory.

Shipments from smelters will drop WoW this week as the smelters have dumped their inventories intensively last week. The downstream consumption is expected to remain low, and SMM presumes that the weak supply and demand cannot improve fundamentally. Therefore, the inventory this week will increase further.