Latest Update in the China Zinc Market

According to SMM survey on the domestic major aluminium processing enterprises, their operating rates will vary during the National Day holiday, depending on their orders. Most of the small and medium-sized enterprises will close for 3-7 days for the holiday, while larger ones will take a shorter or even no break.

This is a roundup of China's metals weekly inventory as of September 30.

SMM offices will be closed for the National Day holiday from October 1 to 7, 2022. There will be no updates on price data and market news, including SMM Morning Comments and Macro Roundup during this period.

Shanghai nonferrous metals closed mostly with gains on the last trading day ahead of the National Day holiday. The higher-than-expected Chinese manufacturing data boosted the demand outlook for the world's largest metal consumer, while the London Metal Exchange (LME) may remove more brands of metal produced by Russian companies from the exchange's deliverable list, also a bullish call.

The following table shows the ferrous and nonferrous metals movement on the SHFE and DCE on Sep 30, 2022

SMM data shows that social inventories of zinc ingots across seven major regions in China totalled 71,100 mt as of September 30, down 21,600 mt from a week ago and 22,900 mt from this Monday.

On the whole, except for galvanising plants, the affected output of die-casting zinc alloy enterprises and zinc oxide producers both increased compared with the previous year (the affected output of galvanising, die-casting zinc alloy and zinc oxide enterprises stood at 6,853 mt, 3,592 mt and 22 mt respectively in 2021).

According to the National Bureau of Statistics, the manufacturing purchasing managers' index (PMI) was 50.1% in September, up 0.7 point from the previous month, back to the expansion zone. T