IN CASE YOU MISSED IT: 5 key stories from June 20

Here are five Fastmarkets MB stories you might have missed on Thursday June 20 that are worth another look.

The London Metal Exchange has just finished its trial to calculate nickel prices using a volume-weighted average price method on the exchange’s electronic trading platform.

China will only permit 240,429 tonnes of copper scrap imports in the entire third quarter of 2019, sending panic across the local scrap industry, according to an official list of Chinese importers granted import quotas, seen by Fastmarkets on Thursday June 20.

Metals trader Trafigura has refuted claims from Iceberg Research, the analytics outfit that launched an explosive campaign against Noble Group, that it has overvalued “hundreds of millions [of dollars] in debt securities issued by an associate.”

United States-based iron ore producer Cleveland-Cliffs is prepared to export part of its iron ore output in the event that more furnaces are shut down in the country, its chairman and chief executive officer Lourenço Gonçalves said on Wednesday. 
 
Pilbara Minerals will restrict its lithium production in June and July due to reduced demand in the second quarter of 2019 caused by delays in the commissioning of chemical conversion capacity by the company’s key offtake partners in China.

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The proposal would align the index more closely with physically traded volumes in the region, and enable it to adjust to evolving market conditions. This proposal follows an observed widening of the spread between trader and smelter purchase components of the index and is aligned with a majority of market feedback. Additionally, Fastmarkets seeks feedback […]
Until now, aluminium has been hard to move, not hard to find. Global aluminium supply had remained technically intact, even as output was curtailed in parts of the Gulf, inventory buffers were drawn down or repositioned, and shipping through the Strait of Hormuz was severely disrupted.
Global aluminium producers face heightened uncertainty over power supplies, with oil and gas prices elevated by the closure of the Strait of Hormuz, through which around 20% of global oil and liquefied natural gas (LNG) flows, sources told Fastmarkets.
Fastmarkets is extending the consultation period for the methodology of several of its black mass payables indicators and prices, and is also proposing changes to the names of CIF South Korea and EWX Europe black mass prices.
Rio Tinto Aluminium is expanding its footprint beyond its historic hydro-powered Canadian base, targeting Europe, Asia and Latin America as part of a deliberate diversification strategy, according to the unit’s chief executive officer.
Fastmarkets has corrected its copper concentrates treatment and refinement charge indices, which were published incorrectly on March 20 2026 due to a technical error.