Europe's top copper smelter Aurubis is undecided as to whether it will follow the settlement made by miner Antofagasta and smelter Jiangxi Copper for copper concentrate treatment and refining charges, it said today.
"Whether the settlement is a benchmark for Aurubis is a big question mark," Christophe Koenig, Aurubis' senior vice president of commercial said by phone today November 23.Chile's Antofagasta will supply China's Jiangxi with copper concentrates from its Los Pelambres and Centinela mines in 2019 with TC/RCs fixed at $80.80 per tonne / 8.08 cents per lb, with both parties agreeing terms last week in Shanghai.Japanese smelters and other major miners such as Freeport McMoRan will follow the number, which is down 1.8% on the 2018 level and marks a six-year low for annual terms, informed sources told Fastmarkets.Yet Aurubis, which smelts over 1.1 million tonnes per year of refined copper...