Concerns over supplies for the year ahead and a strong purchasing appetite from traders and mills continued to provide momentum to noble alloys prices in the first few days of January.
Molybdic oxide prices staged the most impressive gains in the (usually quiet) first days of the year, jumping to $10.70-11 per lb, in-warehouse Rotterdam, on Wednesday January 3. Prices were assessed up 10.2% from the end of December, and at their highest level since September 2014, according to Metal Bulletin data. "The demand is there and the supply is super tight," a trader source said, noting that traders had been more active than consumers in looking to buying units. "It's a lot of the same material changing hands, and it's going into strong hands for sure, but that material can't hang around indefinitely," the trader said. For the...