Asia top nickel producer Jinchuan raises the price to 92,000 yuan

April 10 MetalBiz--Asian top nickel producer Jinchuan Group announced on 8th that it will raise its ex-work price of electrolytic nickel to 92,000 yuan per ton from 89,000 yuan per ton, which is the third time to incline the price in a month.

The daily average price of nickel in Shanghai spot market arrived at 91,750 yuan per ton on 8th, up 1,250 yuan compared with the previous day.

Jinchuan adjusted down its ex-work price of nickel from 86,000 yuan per ton to the year's bottom of 84,000 yuan per ton on March 12, but then it raised the price to 86,000 yuan per ton on March 20, and further to 89,000 yuan per ton on April 3.

It's learned that LME nickel stocks still hovered at around 106,000 tons, but the nickel price had surged from $9,500 at the end of March to $11,000 recently. It continued presenting the rallying trend this week.

Market analysts note that Jinchuan is unwilling to sell on expectation for higher price, leading to tight supply of nickel. Meanwhile, speculators rush for stockpiling and the downstream manufacturers prepare to increase inventory at a low price. All these factors serve to boost nickel price in Shanghai market.

A person in Baosteel holds that nickel price has limited room to decline from 9,000 U.S. dollars per ton due to the sound demand for some stainless steel products. The company's stainless steel output reached 100,000 tons in the January-March period without piling up stocks.

A report by BOC International Ltd. predicted that the domestic stainless steel production capacity was about 10mln tons, with annual capacity of 7.2mln tons and demand of 7mln tons.

According to the report, quick capacity expansion of nickel in the past two years has led to its oversupply in the domestic market and the government is planning to purchase 30,000-50,000 tons for reserve. However, because the government's purchase price is lower than the cash price, producers are reluctant to sell and the deal hasn't been closed yet.

Jinchuan president Yang Zhiqiang revealed that the company considers enlarging nickel output when the price is at a low level. It aims to produce 120,000 tons of nickel and about 400,000 tons of copper this year.