Despite ending 2018 as the best performer among the base metals after being the worst in the previous year, London Metal Exchange tin has entered the fourth quarter of 2019 as the laggard.
The metal's three-month price on the exchange has fallen by more than 18% since the start of the year, when the price came near to $20,000 per tonne. At the same time, open interest on the exchange has also trended lower, falling from more than 24,000 open positions in February to just over 20,000 positions in mid-October.Tin's outright price on the LME closed at $16,550 per tonne on Wednesday October 23, a loss of some $3,500 per tonne compared with the start of the year.But the current price is a significant improvement from late August, when tin reached its lowest level since 2016 at $15,565 per tonne on August 27. But a climb of 6.4% in two months was not enough to keep up with the stalwarts of the base metals complex.Broad risk-off sentiment coming out of the US-China trade dispute was a prevailing factor across the complex and has...