China’s top steelmaking hub, Tangshan in Hebei province, has issued its air pollution control plan for April, continuing to exempt steelmakers that are graded as A and B on their environmental status,

A nickel sulphate producer in north China planned to conduct annual maintenance for about a month from the beginning of April, sources told SMM on March 30.

Eighteen provinces in China including Shandong and Anhui have rolled out plans to construct a total of more than 413,000 5G base stations this year, as China speeds up the investment in new infrastructure to bolster consumption amid the impact of coronavirus outbreak.

The temporary suspension of the Ambatovy project may barely impact the near-term supply of nickel briquette supply in China. Nonetheless, it will increase China’s dependence on nickel briquette from other sources of imports such as Australia and South Africa, given current low inventories of such materials in China. 

Malaysia has launched an antidumping investigation into flat-rolled products of non-alloy steel plated or coated with aluminum and zinc originating in or imported from China, South Korea and Vietnam.

SMM estimates that there were 69 vessels carrying 11 million mt of iron ore arrived at major Chinese ports during March 22-28, down 750,000mt from the week ended March 21.

The following table shows the ferrous and nonferrous metals movement on the SHFE and DCE on March 31, 2020

The combined iron ore shipments from Australia and Brazil remained in a steady upward trend and this is likely to lift the arrivals at Chinese ports in the near term

The US dollar rebounded on Monday, Wall Street enjoyed a solid start to the week.

The physical port stock prices for PBF in Shandong market fell by 10-15yuan/mt and that in Tangshan market dropped by 5-15yuan/mt. Both bids and offers in the physical port stock market decrease sharply.