IN CASE YOU MISSED IT: 5 key stories from October 16

Here are five Fastmarkets MB stories you might have missed on Wednesday October 16 that are worth another look.

Slab shipments to foreign subsidiaries and affiliates of Russia’s largest steelmaker, Novolipetsk Steel (NLMK), fell by 43% year on year in the third quarter of 2019.

A strike kicked off on October 16 at Antofagasta’s Antucoya copper project after workers could not reach an agreement on wage increases with the Chilean miner.

Persisting backwardations in London Metal Exchange forward price spreads continued to pressure global aluminium premiums in the week ended Tuesday October 15, with the benchmark duty-unpaid premium in the Dutch port of Rotterdam softening for the third week in a row.

Manganese ore traders are becoming increasingly cautious about buying seaborne cargoes after suffering severe losses on large positions amid recent price falls.

Physical zinc premiums in Shanghai softened in the week to October 15, with the import loss for bringing zinc into the region widening by just under $100 per tonne since last week; meanwhile a drop in the Northern Europe premium was exacerbated by poor demand and tight forward spreads.

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Africa’s first transcontinental rail network, known as the Lobito Corridor, which aims to eventually connect almost the entire regional copper-cobalt belt with additional links across sub-Saharan Africa, is on track to break ground early in 2026, a senior official at the US Department of State told Fastmarkets.
The availability of relatively untapped resources, a huge influx of Chinese investment and a rapid licensing system have helped the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) to become one of the world’s three key producers of copper.
The European steel and aluminium scrap industries urged the European Commission on Wednesday January 15 against taking action to curb scrap exports after domestic industry metals producers backed measures to do just that.
Renewed US-China trade tensions with Donald Trump’s second presidential term could bolster Southeast Asia’s aluminium scrap industry in 2025, particularly amid still-growing Chinese demand, sources told Fastmarkets by Tuesday, January 14.
European steel and aluminium producers have urged the European Commission to take immediate and effective action to tackle "scrap leakage" so that the European Union can meet its sustainable development aims and secure industrial competitiveness.