The China Smelters Purchase Team (CSPT) decided on a guide price for treatment and refining charges (TC/RCs) for copper concentrate processing in the third quarter of 2023 at $95 per tonne and 9.5 cents per pound at the quarterly meeting on Thursday, July 6. While the guidance for the charges was set at $90 per tonne and 9.0 cents per pound for the second quarter of this year.
Overseas supply disruptions have resurfaced. The operation and delivery of mines in South America and Africa are affected by rainstorm, windy, and heave wave weather to varying degrees, but have not caused fluctuations in downstream demand for the time being.
Chinese copper smelters are in a period of intensive maintenance, and most of them have reduced their raw material usage or extended the maintenance period, which may lead to more raw material resale. The interference of sulfuric acid in the operation of smelters has temporarily weakened, but it will still have an impact on raw material procurement in the second half of the year. The new production capacity of Shandong Guoxing had been put into operation in mid-June. Some smelters in Gansu, Inner Mongolia, and Shanxi provinces will increase production in the second half of 2023 and have completed their raw material procurement plans.
Mysteel's standard clean copper concentrate TC was $89.2-92.0/dmt in June 2023, with a monthly average of $90.7/dmt, an increase of 2.9% month on month and 19.7% year on year. Mysteel's clean copper concentrate (26%) spot price increased by 1.3% month on month but decreased by 8.5% year on year to $2,008-2,112/dmt, with an average price of $2,062/dmt.
Data Source: Mysteel
Written by Edenlis Huang, huangting@mysteel.com
Edited by Paula Xu, xuzhongping@mysteel.com