Latest Update in the China Lead Market

This is a roundup of China's metals weekly inventory as of July 23.

SHFE nonferrous metals all went up today, amid the dovish statement by the European Central Bank president, the high US jobless claims, and the high July PMI in Eurozone.

Operating rates across lead-acid battery producers in Jiangsu, Zhejiang, Jiangxi, Hubei and Hebei provinces stood largely flat at 69.41% on the week as of Friday July 23.

Operating rates across licensed smelters of secondary lead in Jiangsu, Anhui, Henan and Guizhou averaged 61.47% in the week ended July 23, up 1.06 percentage points from the previous week, showed an SMM survey.

Operating rates across primary lead smelters in Henan, Hunan and Yunnan provinces lost 1.09 percentage points from the previous week to 60.7% in the week ended July 23, showed an SMM survey.

Social inventories of lead ingots across Shanghai, Guangdong, Zhejiang, Jiangsu and Tianjin expanded 1,300 mt from last Friday July 16 to 159,000 mt as of July 23. This was down 40 mt from Monday July 19.

The following table shows the ferrous and nonferrous metals movement on the SHFE and DCE on July 23, 2021

Shanghai base metals mostly cruised higher on Friday morning amid dovish comments from European Central Bank. Meanwhile, their counterparts on the LME traded mixed.