Stalemate in Tug-of-War Between Longs and Shorts, Market Stabilizes and Consolidates in Narrow Range [SMM EMM Weekly Review]

This week, the domestic EMM market saw a tug-of-war between longs and shorts. The earlier slight pullback slowed down, and the overall market held steady temporarily, with cautious trading sentiment.

Cost side, prices of core raw materials such as manganese ore and sulphuric acid remained firm. Meanwhile, smelters’ phased production cuts continued and leading smelters showed strong willingness to hold prices firm, providing solid support for the market bottom and capping the downside room. Supply side, market supply steadily increased in July, with the industry operating rate and social inventory rising simultaneously, keeping the overall supply-demand pattern relatively loose. Demand side, the market remained in the traditional consumption off-season, with downstream stainless steel and lithium battery sectors only maintaining routine just-in-time procurement and no centralized restocking, while end-users showed strong wait-and-see sentiment. This month, steel mills’ tender procurement volumes shrank and efforts to push for lower prices intensified, making downstream purchasing mentality more conservative. Retail quotations lacked upward momentum. Additionally, recent typhoons along the coast disrupted port logistics, delaying export shipments and further dampening market trading sentiment. Overall, high raw material prices formed bottom support, limiting deep downside room, but multiple bearish factors persisted, including July’s supply growth, off-season demand weakness, reduced steel mill tender volumes and price pressure, and logistics disruptions. In the short term, EMM will likely consolidate in a narrow range, with prices unlikely to see a trending move.