IN CASE YOU MISSED IT: 5 key stories from January 2

Here are five Fastmarkets MB stories you might have missed on Thursday January 2 that are worth another look.

The Chinese city of Ganzhou has launched an exchange for physical trading of rare earths and other minor metals.

The outlook for aluminium scrap prices in the United States appears gloomy on the surface for 2020, with market sources noting that the US market remains plagued by oversupply. 

Demand for reinforcing bar is set to recover in Brazil this year, market participants said – and mills have already announced a first round of price increases.

Buyers and sellers have agreed on the premium to be applied to fourth-quarter shipments of direct-reduced iron pellet, while negotiations for shipments in the first quarter of 2020 have continued but at lower levels, sources told Fastmarkets in late December.

The majority of Chinese annual blister copper supply contracts for 2020 have settled at significantly lower refining charges due to expected tight supply of the intermediate product.

What to read next
Fastmarkets launches MB-NI-0256 nickel low-carbon briquette premium, cif global, $/tonne, on Wednesday May 1.
Fastmarkets will amend its MB-STE-0092 steel reinforcing bar (rebar) domestic, exw Poland, zloty/tonne price assessment on Friday May 3.
Just under two weeks ago, the chair of BHP made a phone call to his counterpart at mining peer Anglo American and set in motion a flurry of activity designed to create the largest copper producer in the world
Ferrous scrap could serve as a linchpin in decarbonizing both the steel and shipping sectors in South Korea, particularly in the short term, while waiting for emerging technologies such as hydrogen-based direct-reduced iron to be commercialized, Fastmarkets heard at a seminar on green steel and circularity
The suspension of South32’s manganese ore operations at Groote Eylandt Mining Co (GEMCO) in Australia has been changing demand patterns among manganese ore buyers in Asia and this will benefit other manganese ore miners, market participants said on Wednesday April 24
Brazilian aluminium supply coming from Companhia Brasileira de Alumínio (CBA) is said to have tightened, helping to boost the P1020A ingot premium, market participants told Fastmarkets in the two weeks to Wednesday April 24