SHANGHAI, Jan 29 (SMM) - As of Friday November 20, the SMM Imported Copper Concentrate Index (weekly) recorded $83.56/mt, down $0.41/mt than that on January 13. The Index has dropped for eight consecutive weeks since November 25, 2022 when the Index stood at $91.08/mt, mainly due to the recent troubled spot market and supply of imported copper concentrate.

In the spot market, in addition to the reduction in work efficiency of market participants due to the pandemic earlier and the recent Chinese New Year holiday, the traders chose to shift their spot positions to the first quarter of 2023 in the hope of more favourable processing fees. On the supply side, the impact of the fire at the Ventanas port in Peru may last longer than the market expected. The production of Glencore's Antapaccay copper mine in Peru was hit by protesters. Las Bambas continues to be negatively impacted by Peruvian political protests and poor logistics efficiency. And the production of the Cobre Panama copper mine in Panama is threatened by the government's taxes and fees.

However, although the production in South America has been frequently disrupted, SMM believes that this has limited impact on the spot market of copper concentrate in China. Because the negative impact of port fires, road blockages and community protests in South America only hindered the shipment of copper concentrates, but did not significantly impact the production activities. The current shipping difficulties are temporary, and the overall supply and demand of copper concentrate have not changed much.