#0 Zinc Premiums in Guangdong to Grow

LME zinc: LME zinc prices fell slightly early last week after a series of economic data was released.

Last Friday, iron ore futures fluctuated upwards, and the most-traded I2305 contract closed at 919 yuan/mt.

The average price of Ni 1.5% ore stood at $72/wmt on a CIF basis last Friday, flat from a week earlier.

Quotes of battery-grade nickel sulphate were 39,600-40,300 yuan/mt last Friday.

According to SMM survey of 34 independent EAF-based steel mills that produce construction steel, their operating rates averaged 48.18% as of February 28.

According to SMM research, a cold-rolled coil factory in south China started a one-week production suspension for maintenance today.

On February 9, the guide price of solar back silver paste stood at 3,589-3,689 yuan/kg.

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.