GACC: China's ferro-nickel imports rise 6.2% in 2024

The growth was largely driven by higher shipments from Indonesia, holder of the world's largest reserves of nickel. Indonesia supplied 8.67 million tonnes of ferro-nickel to China last year, reflecting a substantial 9.48% increase compared to the previous year, GACC data shows.

Most of China's imported ferro-nickel arrives in the form of nickel pig iron (NPI) from Indonesia, with a smaller portion being FeNi, a higher-grade ferroalloy which typically contains more than 20% nickel. In comparison, high-grade NPI contains around 12% nickel. The GACC data only shows tonnage for ferro-nickel, including NPI and FeNi under its FeNi category, Mysteel Global notes.

While Indonesia's FeNi exports to China reached a record high, market analysts noted that last year's growth fell short of expectations. This was mainly due to delays in the approval of Indonesia's Work Plan and Budget (RKAB), which restricted the production of nickel ore and its ferroalloy derivatives.

The relaxation of Jakarta's approval restrictions at year's end led to a surge in total ferro-nickel shipments to China in December, which hit a historic high of 995,100 tonnes, up 12.73% year-on-year. Of this, 969,900 tonnes came from Indonesia, according to the GACC data.

As of now, a total of 250 million wet metric tons of nickel ore have been approved for production this year under the RKAB. "While this volume still falls short of the global demand of around 290 million wmt in 2025, it is a positive sign for ferro-nickel imports to China in the first half of the year, when the quota is expected to be more abundant," commented a nickel analyst based in Wuxi. However, he cautioned that the situation should be closely monitored, as any tightening of Indonesian policy could lead to a reduction in nickel supply if market conditions worsened.

Looking ahead, NPI is expected to maintain its dominant role in China's stainless steel production as a major nickel source, the analyst added. Mysteel's survey revealed that in 2024, domestic stainless steel production consumed 77.68% NPI, 3.81% FeNi, and 17.86% stainless scrap.

Imported NPI gained traction among domestic stainless steelmakers in 2024 due to its lower price compared to domestic NPI. Mysteel's data showed that the profit margin for producing a tonne of stainless cold-rolled coil (CRC) using imported NPI was 0.39% as of December 31, 2024, while using domestic NPI resulted in a loss for the stainless makers of 2.4%.

Significantly, as of last December 31, domestic stainless steelmakers could achieve a margin of 1.87% per tonne of stainless CRC produced. Despite these profits, China's consumption of stainless scrap in stainless steel production is unlikely to grow significantly in the short term, primarily due to limited supply driven by the long lifespan of austenitic stainless steel, the analyst explained.

Written by Adele Pan, panqinjie@mysteel.com    

Edited by Russ McCulloch, russ.mcculloch@mysteel.com