Scenari & tendenze: main metals trend at June 13th 2018

Present metal market situation is very critical: those operators who need to source are facing difficulties bearing such a market volatility created by speculation. But what's the trend of the main metals?

Starting with the non ferrous metals in general, it's clear they all have reported an average increase in prices since 2016 (abt. +70%). However, this increase is not the result of a mere financial speculation, as we've seen an over 70% drop in non ferrous metals physical stocks.

Here below a short analysis of the main metals trend.

Aluminium: constant growth, especially in the last months due to American penalties against Rusal, the most important non-China producer that could have cut a huge quantity of aluminium availability on the market. This lead to the continuous reactions of the last months, that could soften as penalties were postponed. Now we still have a growing trend, but in an adjustment period and justified by a substantial and continuous fall in volumes.

Copper: this metal didn't face as important peaks as aluminium did, but we can anyway notice a growing trend, followed by an adjustment phase. However, the latest movements almost reached the maximal level forecasted for this year. If copper should reach and cross this level, it would then have room for a rise. Regarding volumes, unlike aliminium we can notice copper stocks have tendency to renew and faced a growth of 30% compared to 2016.

Nickel: this metal found a new demand thanks to the new batteries for the electric car. By now, the attention on this metal is more speculative than real. The growing trend is accompanied by volumes that, even if still significant, has been continuosly falling, especially since the beginning of 2018.

Zinc: prices faced a growth at 144% in two years and volumes turn out to be very little. There was an adjustment of abt. 15%, but now is already rising and we'll continue to do so, also due to a fall in volumes.

Source: Associazione Industriale Bresciana (AIB) - Date "Scenari & Tendenze" on June 13th 2018