WEEKLY: Chinese alumina prices edge lower; stocks top three-year high

Mysteel assessed the national average spot price for smelter-grade alumina with a purity exceeding 98.6% at Yuan 2,909/tonne ($409/t) on October 30, down by Yuan 21/t or 0.7% from a week earlier. The drop was narrower than the 1% decline recorded the previous week, Mysteel Global noted.

The slower rate of decline reflected slightly better sentiment among some alumina producers and traders last week, supported by small-scale output interruptions caused by heavy air pollution alerts in North China's Hebei and Central China's Henan.

An alumina refiner in Tangshan city in Hebei suspended operations on two calciners for four days starting from October 27 to comply with a severe pollution alert issued by local authorities, cutting production by around 7,000 tonnes per day, as reported. One day later, another refiner in Luoyang city in Henan halted its calciners for three days from October 28 following a similar warning, though the impact on its overall output was minimal, according to market sources.

Despite these temporary disruptions, last week's total alumina production was largely stable. Mysteel's survey showed that during October 24-30, metallurgical-grade alumina output among the 44 Chinese producers under its tracking dipped slightly by 0.5% on week to 1.85 million tonnes.

Meanwhile, alumina inventories continued building to reach the highest level in more than three years last week, as domestic alumina output remained steady and imported supplies continued to arrive, market watchers noted.

Total alumina stocks across China's ten major ports, 44 refiners, 89 smelters, and rail yards or in transit regularly tracked by Mysteel had risen for the 22nd consecutive week as of October 30 to reach 4.7 million tonnes, up by 0.9% on week and 23% on year. This marked the highest stock level since Mysteel began the survey in early January 2022, Mysteel Global noted.

Of the total stock accumulation, stocks at the ten major Chinese ports increased by 20,000 tonnes, with significant climbs seen at Panjin and Jinzhou ports in Northeast China's Liaoning province due to arrivals of imported alumina from Australia, Indonesia, and India, Mysteel's survey results showed.  

On the demand side, alumina consumption remained stable. The 89 primary aluminum smelters regularly sampled in Mysteel's survey consumed a total of 1.64 million tonnes of alumina last week, up by a tiny 0.01% from the prior week.

Written by Iris Pang, pangjunyu@mysteel.com