A weekly brief on the Fastmarkets’ copper concentrate index:
- At $65.80 per tonne/6.58 cents per lb, the index is now at its highest level since late March 2019. It is unchanged after a sharp increase last week.
- A 10,000 tonne Phu Kham tender for April shipment is open this week with levels of trader purchase TC assessed at high-$50s to mid-$60s.
- Several Chinese smelters are buying clean concentrates at a range of mid-$60s to low-$70s on a cif China basis this week, although by-product sale of sulphuric acid is still difficult for regions close to the quarantined Hubei province.
- China Copper, owner of Yunnan Copper’s Ningde and Chifeng smelter, bought 120,000 tonnes of clean copper concentrates for the first half of this year from a major trading house at a TC of more than $70 per tonne.
- Chinese copper smelter Guangxi Nanguo has resumed intake of concentrates and cathode production. The 300,000 tonne-per-year smelter declared force majeure in early February on shipments of copper concentrates.
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