SMM January 16 news:
During the week, secondary lead smelters sold at large discounts due to poor transactions, and lowered purchase prices for raw material scrap batteries to ease cost pressure; scrap battery suppliers, fearing price declines, sold off goods, and secondary lead enterprises generally reported improved raw material arrival. SMM data shows that raw material inventory at secondary lead smelters increased by over 25,000 mt WoW. Environmental protection-related controls led to production restrictions at smelters, slowing down the digestion of raw material inventory at secondary lead smelters; coupled with lead prices retreating after a rapid rise, SMM expects scrap battery prices to follow the downward trend. However, as smelter stockpiling demand persists before the Chinese New Year holiday, the decline is expected to be limited.
It is reported that imported crude lead arrived at ports this week, with the mainstream tax-inclusive port self pick-up price at a discount of 100-0 yuan/mt against the SMM #1 lead average price; the antimony and tin content of the supply is average, lacking attractiveness; meanwhile, domestic consumption performance is weak, and suppliers indicated low purchase willingness from downstream, putting transactions under pressure. As of January 16, 2026, domestic secondary crude lead ex-works tax-exclusive offers ranged from 15,750-15,900 yuan/mt, with sales also performing poorly. From a fundamental perspective, supply in the secondary crude lead market is expected to remain loose next week, and there is a probability that offers for arrived port cargo may soften.
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