Stainless Steel News and Nickel Prices, Molybdenum, Metal Pricing, Ferrochrome
Daily Nickel/Stainless Steel Briefing
- Nickel closed Monday’s trading session at
$7.77/lb
($17,125/tonne). Indicators at 6:05 am CST today show nickel trading unchanged 
. Stockpiles of nickel stored in LME licensed warehouses fell on Monday and ended that session just under the 249,400 tonne level. Nickel climbed back above the $17,000.tonne level yesterday, and so far this morning, has moved very little. The Euro is trading higher again, which adds positive sentiment, but apparently not enough to move the trading price. Interesting read below “No commodities super-cycle….”. Apparently the Asian markets are more skeptical of a so-called commodity super cycle, than some of the western metals analysts have been. We have spent a lot of time in the last few years, talking about the on again, off again, nickel export ban out of Indonesia. For years, Indonesia seemed more like an island chain of ‘potential’ nickel mining, but little more. After the so called ‘pig nickel’ became so popular, Indonesia played catch up to the Philippines, but in just a few short years, has become a major player in the nickel industry. And not just nickel mining. Every day it seems like a foreign investor is committing to building a mine, a smelter, or manufacturing EV batteries in that country. If you haven’t noticed yet, you soon will. Indonesia appears to be offering a serious economic challenge to China, so this could get interesting in the coming years. It’s the “well it’s no longer Monday” day. Stay safe out there and have a great day! - Average price of LME traded cash nickel so far this month – $8.01/lb
- LME nickel chart – here / Euro/US Dollar chart – here
Reports
- Reuters metals morning – China crackdown on prices subdues industrial metals – more
- Refinitiv Inside Commodities – pdf here
- ING The Commodities Feed – daily here
- SMM Evening Comment – more
- Barchart 304 Stainless Steel Scrap Index (lb) – $.3845
- SHFE Stainless Steel Futures (yuan) – 15,305
- The Weekly JMP Report – more
Why Stainless Steel
- Alloyed for Lasting Value video – here
- Self Repairing for Lasting Value video – here
- 100 Years of Stainless Steel Video – here
- Stainless steel: The role of nickel – here
- The Life of Nickel – pdf here
Monday’s market review – Copper up, but potential Chinese price curbs weigh – Copper prices rose on Monday as a softer dollar spurred modest purchases, but gains were capped by concerns over price curbs on industrial metals in top consumer China. – more
No commodities ‘super-cycle’ but copper demand from green economy bright – Commodities markets are unlikely to experience a “super-cycle” in the next few years, experts and audience polled at an online metals seminar on Tuesday said. – more
Taiwan’s Yusco & Tang Eng expected to raise stainless steel prices for Jun – Yieh United Steel Corp. (Yusco) and Tang Eng Iron Works Co., Ltd., two leading stainless steel upstream suppliers in Taiwan, will successively announce their prices for June next week. – more
Iron Ore Price Caves But Miners Remain Hugely Profitable, For Now – Chinese Government pressure on steel mills and commodity traders started to pay off earlier today when the iron price fell below $200 a ton for the first time in three weeks. – more
Indonesia says building $1.2 bln battery plant with S.Korea’s LG – State-owned Indonesia Battery Corporation (IBC) and South Korea’s LG will build a new battery plant worth $1.2 billion with the capacity of 10 gigawatt hours (GWh), Indonesia’s investment minister said on Monday. – more
Global steel price records continue to be broken – Steel transaction values are at levels not seen before. The MEPS global averages, for strip mill products, moved to new record highs in May. – more
Molybdenum Trade Rises – We looked at chrome in the last issue and cover molybdenum (moly) in this one. Moly is less easy to cover in that the processing stages vary from other raw materials used in stainless. – more
Courtesy AISI – In the week ending on May 22, 2021, domestic raw steel production was 1,793,000 net tons while the capability utilization rate was 79.0 percent. Production was 1,223,000 net tons in the week ending May 22, 2020 while the capability utilization then was 54.6 percent. The current week production represents a 46.6 percent increase from the same period in the previous year. – more
Other News
- Reuters The Day Ahead – pdf here
- Will Joe Biden Continue America’s Delusional Cuba Policy? – more
- Biden looks abroad for electric vehicle metals, in blow to U.S. miners – more
- Futures Buoyed by Fed Price Comments; Dollar Slips: Markets Wrap – more
Morning Stats and Prices
- What time is it in….? – more
- U.S. Steel Import Monitor – online here
- SIMA Melt & Pour Dashboard – online here
- US Economy At a Glance – more
- US Fed NY Weekly Economic Index – more
- Yesterday’s LME official prices here
- Shanghai Jinchuan nickel price – here
- India MCX Nickel Price – more
- Baltic Dry Index – chart
- COVID By The Numbers – here