Gold has big year in 2020 and outlook for this year robust. Learn about monetary expansion and gold future prices.Read More

The gold futures price reached US$1,767/ounce this week before retreating, which was the second time it has surpassed US$1,760 in the past two months, marking some of gold's highest levels in several years.Read More

Traders and investors are placing more bets on the outright price of copper after being incentivized by greater volatility, metals-focused fund managers said during Fastmarkets Copper Seminar.The London Metal Exchange three-month benchmark copper price contract rose sharply in intraday volatility since the Covid-19 pandemic started in early 2020, after years of narrow daily movement.Quantitative e...Read More

Metal markets are still yet to see the major flows of institutional capital into commodities that characterized past "super-cycles", fund managers told attendees of the virtual Fastmarkets Copper Seminar on Thursday March 11.Commodities from oil to grains and metals have seen prices rise sharply since the start of the year, with bank analysts and executives like Goldman Sachs' Lloyd Blankfein call...Read More

The growth in the adoption of electric and hybrid vehicles will see global refined copper demand rise by 20% per year until 2030, participants at a Fastmarkets Copper Seminar were told on Thursday March 11. "Based on our copper demand projections for all types of [electric] vehicles, we estimate refined copper demand, between 2020 and 2030, will increase on average by 21%," Fastmarkets analyst Bor...Read More

The premium on alumina cargoes in Brazil compared to Australian units is at its highest in more than two years on Thursday March 11 due to continued lack of balance in supply between the Pacific and the Atlantic, sources said.Fastmarkets' alumina index adjustment to fob Australia index, Brazil was at a premium of $7.83 per tonne on Thursday, widening from $0.90 per tonne on February 23."It's no su...Read More

Europe's proposed Carbon Border Adjustment Mechanism (CBAM) has been approved by a firm majority in the European Parliament and is expected to help to preserve the region's steel supply chain, industry association Eurofer has said.On Wednesday March 10, the European Parliament voted on the CBAM resolution, prior to a legislative proposal expected to be published by the European Commission (EC) in...Read More

Steel mill shipments in the United States rose by 5.3% to 7.42 million net tons in January 2021 from 7.05 million net tons in December 2020, according to the American Iron and Steel Institute (AISI).This follows a 4.4% month-on-month rise in December. The AISI has reported month-on-month increases in shipment volumes since June 2020.The January total, however, is down by 13.1% from 8.54 milli...Read More

Domestic prices for steel hot-rolled coil in Europe substantially increased day on day on Thursday March 11, due to a shortage of material combined with good demand, sources have told Fastmarkets.Fastmarkets calculated its daily steel hot-rolled coil index, domestic, exw Northern Europe, at ?,?791.79 ($940.79) per tonne on Thursday, up by ?,?29.29 per tonne from ?,?762.50 per tonne on March 10.The...Read More

Demand for steel billet and rebar in Egypt has been very weak over the past seven days, with prices unchanged, and with market participants now asking for the country's construction ban to be removed, sources told Fastmarkets on Thursday March 11.Construction permits have been limited in Egypt since May 2020, with a small number of permits issued in September.But the current permits were not enoug...Read More

Turkish steel billet prices have remained largely stable over the past week on limited demand, while sentiment turned negative with the latest downturn in scrap prices, market sources told Fastmarkets on Thursday March 11.Billet producers in the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS) faced pressure from lower scrap values and rising transportation costs.Turkish steel producers had booked deep-se...Read More

South Africa iShares (EZA) moved above $49.55 extending an intermediate uptrend.Fiserv (FISV), a NASDAQ 100 stock moved above $125.05 to an all-time highOracle dropped $6.57 to $65.55 despite reporting higher than consensus third quarter revenues and earnings. However, cloud revenues were lower than previous guidance.Linamar (LMN) advanced $8.39 to $88.40 after reporting higher than consensus four...Read More

Turkish steelmakers continued to stay back from the deep-sea scrap markets because of falling prices and increasing supply, market sources said on Thursday March 11.Two Turkish steelmakers booked US cargoes last Saturday and late on Monday at $453-456 per tonne cfr on an HMS 1&2 (80:20) basis, sending the daily scrap indices down by $5.79 per tonne on March 9.But booking activity did not continue,...Read More

Momentum has faded in the Japanese steel scrap export market following six straight weeks of increases, with buyers stepping away from closing sales, sources told Fastmarkets this week.Japan scrap export prices fell over the last week in the markets for H2 heavy scrap and Shindachi busheling, while tags for shredded and heavy scrap or plate and structural (P&S) material remained more stable.Fastma...Read More

Iron ore prices were firmer on Thursday March 11, most likely because of lower steel inventories and firmer demand for steel, sources said.Fastmarkets iron ore indices 62% Fe fines, cfr Qingdao: $170.70 per tonne, up $6.03 per tonne62% Fe low-alumina fines, cfr Qingdao: $170.79 per tonne, up $6.04 per tonne58% Fe fines high-grade premium, cfr Qingdao: $156.05 per tonne, up $4.13 per tonne65% Fe Br...Read More

The seaborne premium hard coking coal fob market was quiet on Thursday March 11, with both sellers and buyers on the sidelines after deals were sealed below $120 per tonne fob Australia early this week.Fastmarkets indicesPremium hard coking coal, fob DBCT: $118.63 per tonne, up $0.36 per tonnePremium hard coking coal, cfr Jingtang: $212.43 per tonne, down $0.55 per tonneHard coking coal, fob DBCT:...Read More

Dollar: a paper money, silver or cupronickel coin, and monetary unit of the United States, equal to 100 cents.So runs the dictionary definition. But if one dollar equals 100 cents... what then is a cent?The answer is one-hundredth of one dollar. And what again is one dollar? 100 cents.And so we begin an infinite chasing of the tail - one dollar is 100 times one cent, one cent is one dollar divided...Read More

Falling scrap prices in Asia have encouraged buyers to stay away from purchasing, market sources told Fastmarkets on Thursday March 11.There was limited interest from buyers amid the falling prices, especially with complementary iron ore prices plunging sharply on March 9 and producers in the key steelmaking hub of Tangshan cutting steel production further this week.Downstream billet and rebar pri...Read More

Today the sun glows brighter…The air is crisper, the grass grows greener, the birds chirp louder. There is more joy in heaven...For rescue is at hand.On Saturday, the United States Senate passed Mr. Biden's $1.9 trillion "stimulus" package - the American Rescue Plan by title.Tomorrow it ships to the House of Representatives... where passage is certain... then on to America's rescue.Individua...Read More

Poor Jerome Powell. This unlikely Atlas bears all the world's weight upon his slender shoulders.We hazard he ages one year for each torturous day he lives.Anything he mumbles - or fails to mumble - can send markets careening.Early yesterday afternoon, he mumbled something to The Wall Street Journal:We expect that as the economy reopens and hopefully picks up, we will see inflation move up through...Read More

"The financial memory," argued John Kenneth Galbraith, "should be assumed to last, at a maximum, no more than 20 years."Why 20 years?This is normally the time it takes for the recollection of one disaster to be erased and for some variant on previous dementia to come forward to capture the financial mind. It is also the time generally required for a new generation to enter the scene, impressed, as...Read More

After World War II, as the economy was converted from a garrison state to meet civilian needs, economists predicted dire times.Just as after World War I, conventional academic wisdom saw no upside to the end of wartime spending that, according to academic legend, ended the Great Depression.A sweeping Republican victory in the Congressional election of 1946 had ended the economic regime of wartime...Read More