WEEK-IN-BRIEF: Ebola in West Africa; Glencore output; the battle over Al spreads; TK Met’s US expansion

What has been going on in metal markets over the past week? A review from the Metal Bulletin team

What effect has the Ebola virus had on West Africa’s mining sector? Metal Bulletin’s Andrea Hotter asked the companies that have operations there. Read the round-up here. 

Metal Bulletin recently looked at the state of the industry across all the mining countries of West Africa, where there is significant bauxite, iron ore and manganese ore production. Click here for Metal Bulletin’s Fast Facts Africa. 

Want a quick glance at Glencore’s production results, which were released on August 13? See them here. 

For a fuller picture of zinc, copper, ferro-chrome and nickel production, take a look here. 

Higher metal prices and sufficient supply of zinc concentrates for the moment have driven up treatment charges for zinc. Here are the details. 

The aluminium cash-to-three-months contango on the London Metal Exchange widened last week, before tightening again. Metal Bulletin’s Jethro Wookey reviewed the battle that is going on in the aluminium spread. 

The US Midwest premium, the European premium and the Japanese premium are the three most widely-watched benchmarks for the physical aluminium market outside the LME price.

Premiums in the USA moved up by 50-75 cents per lb last week, as the market remained flat at elevated levels in Japan and Brazil: sellers feel strong enough not to sell, and buyers do not need to add to contracted volumes – yet.

Check the latest reports from the USA, Brazil and Japan. 

Russian separatists seized Privat Group’s Stakhanov ferro-alloys plant earlier this month. Privat will increase ferro-silicon production at Zaporozhye to compensate for production lost at Stakhanov. Find out more here. 

ThyssenKrupp Metallurgical Products is adding a ferro-alloys trading desk to its operations in the USA. Metal Bulletin has all the details. 

A close reading of Umicore’s results a couple of weeks ago revealed a joint venture that the Belgium-based speciality product company had done with China-based Vital Materials.

What does the deal mean for the indium market inside and outside China? A briefing here. 

And find out more here about the production – and a ready buyer for it. 

The London Metal Exchange published its second commitment of traders report. In which market did money managers cut long positions by 12%? Check our take on the data here. 

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