Spot SiMn Trading Remains Sluggish as the Chinese New Year Comes Closer, while the Futures Market Picks up

In June, the market was in anticipation of the sharp interest rate hikes in the Europe and US and the global economic recession, and the shorts completely took over the commodity market.

SHANGHAI, Jun 24 (SMM) - According to SMM survey, the market demand for aluminium plate/sheet and strip this week was still not optimistic.

Huayou Cobalt issued an announcement on investment that the company plans to jointly build Huashan Nickel-Cobalt with an annual output of 120,000 mt of Ni content and nickel-cobalt hydroxide hydrometallurgy project with Glaucous through its wholly-owned subsidiary Huatuo International Development Pte. Ltd.

LME lead opened at $2,056/mt and rose by 2.34% to $2,098/mt overnight, after hitting the lowest point of $2,042/mt and the highest point of $2,099.5/mt. During the Asian trading hours, affected by the SHFE lead, LME lead fluctuated between $2,050-2070/mt while in the European trading hours,  LME lead hit one-month low amid the increase of US dollar and then rose up due to the increase of SHFE lead. The most traded SHFE 2207 lead contract opened at 14,960 yuan/mt overnight and rose up to 15,195 yuan/mt as the lead ingot warrant inventories declined by 8,000 mt, and finally closed at 15,180 yuan/mt, up 1.71%. The open interest decreased by 5,454 lots from the previous trading day to 44,274 lots.

Technology analyst company CCS Insight said in its latest global market forecast report that 5G mobile technology users will exceed 1 billion in 2022.

Manganese ore import prices differed significantly in May. The monthly average price of Australia lump remained at 62 yuan/mtu, flat MoM.

For the highly concerned crude steel production cuts in Jiangsu, a reporter learned from industry sources, that relative noticed did have been released in Jiangsu.

Price of mainstream rare earth products such as PrNd fluctuate in a narrow range. The mainstream transaction prices in the praseodymium-neodymium oxide market today fell slightly to 960,000-970,000 yuan/mt, and the mainstream transaction prices in the praseodymium-neodymium alloy market stabled at 1.16-1.17 million yuan/mt. After the Dragon Boat Festival, the price of PrNd oxide and PrNd alloy rebounded as the separation enterprises tended to hold the prices firm and the cost was high.

On Tuesday, Chile’s central bank announced that the country's copper exports in May reached $3.76 billion, down 18.3% from the same period last year.

According to SMM research, as of June 8, none of the top-tier steel mills in Jiangsu Province has received production restrictions for the time being, but...