ASIAN MORNING BRIEF 11/01: Nickel rallies further on LME; technical issues drive Birla Copper to cut output at Dahej smelter in India; planned strike at Glencore's Minera Lomas Bayas copper mine in Chile called off

The latest news and price moves to start the Asian day on Thursday January 11.

Nickel continued to rally on the London Metal Exchange during afternoon trading on Wednesday January 10, closing in positive territory alongside the rest of the metals. Read more here in our live futures report.

Here are how prices looked at the end of the day on Wednesday.


Unspecified technical issues at Birla Copper's Dahej copper smelter in India have caused the plant to lower output and delay scheduled cargoes of copper concentrates or divert material into the spot market, sources told Metal Bulletin. 

A union strike scheduled to start on January 10 at Glencore's Minera Lomas Bayas copper mine in Chile has been called off after a breakthrough in contract negotiations.

After a year focused on re-establishing stability, the London Metal Exchange has started 2018 with its attention on driving more liquidity to the bourse by launching the Introducing Broker membership category and broadening its contract portfolio, senior metals market consultant Martin Hayes said.

A restart of production operations at the Ambatovy nickel-cobalt joint venture in Madagascar after a recent tropical cyclone has been delayed to the end of the month due to equipment damage, according to Sherritt International.

Liberty House confirmed on Wednesday that it has made a binding conditional offer of $500 million for Rio Tinto's Dunkerque aluminium smelter in northern France, the largest smelter in Europe.

The Aluminium Extrusions Fair Trade Committee has filed a request with the US Commerce Department to issue a circumvention determination for imports of aluminium extrusions from Vietnam.

The US Midwest aluminium premium has ticked up this week due to higher trucking costs and speculation of possible aluminium import tariffs.

US secondary aluminium alloy prices have held steady, supported by tight spot supply as well as elevated raw materials and transportation costs.

While the US copper premium was again unchanged, market participants reported growing confidence due to increased demand and market activity after  the recent holiday lull.

Metals merchant Traxys has hired Paolo Cabrejos to lead and expand its West Latin American trading unit starting this month.

US non-ferrous scrap exports backpedaled in November, with aluminium and copper scrap leading the erosion to the prior month's short-lived gains.

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