Weekly Brief on Lead Concentrates Market (May 18, 2026 - May 22, 2026) [SMM Lead Concentrates Weekly Review]

This week, smelters in some regions mentioned that lead concentrate TCs showed signs of further decline. The weekly average TC for domestic Pb50 was lowered to 250 yuan/mt Pb. Some silver-lead ores rich in copper and zinc were quoted with TCs far below market transaction prices because the contained metals were not paid or had low payable indicators. The supply of imported ore remained tight, with limited transactions. The weekly average TC for imported Pb60 was reported at -$135/dmt. Smelters continued to maintain a mainstream quotation range of -$150 to -$130/dmt. A few individual smelters could still accept quotations of -$180 to -$200/dmt for imported silver-lead ores with good content due to by-product revenue needs and other reasons. Silver prices continued to move sideways this week. Buyers and sellers had not yet reached a consensus on the silver price rebound trend. However, silver-bearing lead ores remained scarce, and the payable indicator for silver maintained a trend of being more likely to rise than fall.