According to China General Administration of Customs, China's combined imports and nickel pig iron (NPI) and ferronickel (FeNi) reported 0.91 million tonnes in August, an increase of 19.6% month on month (MoM) and 45.6% year on year (YoY).
The monthly growth was primarily due to Indonesia's NPI flowing back to China intensively, which jumped 18.7% from July at 867,000 t in August.
Source: China General Administration of Customs
The imports of NPI and FeNi combined were 5.2 million t year-to-date, rising 48.6% from 2022.
The intensive flowing back of Indonesia's NPI was attributed to the following causes.
1. Busy production scheduling of stainless steel mills
Despite falling stainless steel spot prices and flat demand, the stainless steel mills maintained high production, creating robust demand for raw materials. The planned stainless steel production edges up 0.8% MoM in September, per Mysteel survey.
2. Disrupted ocean shipping returned to normal
The transportation of Indonesia's NPI was disrupted by typhoon Dussuri in late July. While the ocean shipping returned to normal, the arrivals at Chinese ports rose quickly to approximately 0.4 million t in early August, much higher than 0.22 million t around mid-August and 0.26 million t by month-end.
Written by Aggie Hu, huchenying@mysteel.com