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    • It’s sad to see the travails of MF Global, which was suspended from trading on the London Metal Exchange yesterday as a result of the fallout from ceo Jon Corzine's bad bet on European sovereign debt. For those of us who have been around a while, we remember the original Gerald Metals brokerage business, the merger with Man, and then the various changes of name over the last few years.
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    • If Rio Tinto manages to sell all of the 13 assets it put up for sale on October 17, it will have divested itself of around 2 million tpy of primary aluminium production capacity, and given itself a substantially longer position in alumina than in aluminium.
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    • Where to start with the 2011 LME dinner week? Not with the obvious: the potential sale of the exchange, although I do have some views and comments about that
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    • Metal Bulletin is proposing a number of changes to its ferro-chrome and chrome ore price quotations, including changes to price specifications, the rationalisation of price descriptions and the elimination of some prices.
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    • Has the long-mooted downgrade in the steel market finally arrived? Signals are emerging that China’s appetite for steel products may not only have been satisfied, but that the commodity-hungry giant may have overeaten
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    • How fast do forecasters change their opinions? As we wrote some weeks back, the true fundamentals just don’t change as fast as the predictions coming from forecasters would seem to indicate
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    • Q: I have run my LME long position to expiry and taken receipt of warrants for material my foundry needs for its production. The warehouse company says that I cannot take possession of my material for ten months because of the long queue of material ahead of mine. I was using the LME as the market of last resort and want to know what rights I have to claim my metal sooner than that?
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    • Glencore’s iron ore marketing business has increased tenfold since its launch in 2008 to 9.3 million tonnes in 2010, up from 900,000 million tonnes.
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    • MF Global's note valuing Glencore's shares at between 360 and 400 pence each may have aroused some ire at the trading company and producer, whose value has suffered since it listed in London and Hong Kong last month.
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    • Man of Steel is the nom de plume of an experienced steel trader, who will be writing a column for Metal Bulletin on a regular basis. Do you agree with him? Email editorial@metalbulletin.com Trading company ceos around the world are worried as they consider their activities and the outlook as they prepare their second-quarter (or second-half) results.
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    Top stories across markets

    Growing Chinese copper output and an imbalance in trade terms between China and the west have led to a rising need for the European copper industry to guard its interests, panelists at Fastmarkets’ International Copper Conference in Amsterdam said on Thursday February 27.

    The Chinese domestic price for silico-manganese has drifted downward significantly in recent assessments because some alloy smelters reduced their offer prices to attract buying interest and generate cash amid the sluggish demand circumstances created by the outbreak of the 2019-nCoV coronavirus, market participants have told Fastmarkets.

    The novel coronavirus (2019-nCoV) outbreak in South Korea, the largest export market for Chinese stainless steel, is likely to apply additional pressure on stainless steel prices in Asia, sources told Fastmarkets this week.

    Deliveries of battery raw materials from Chinese producers to consumers in South Korea and Japan are continuing as usual despite a recent surge in the number of people infected by the novel coronavirus (2019-nCoV) in the latter two countries, Fastmarkets understands.

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