Price Trend

In July 2019, the domestic 1_tin ingot Market as a whole declined, with the average price of the domestic market at the beginning of the month at 142712.50 yuan/ton, and at the end of the week at 13517.50 yuan/ton, a decline of 5.31%.

On July 31, the tin commodity index was 68.84, down 0.19 points from yesterday, down 31.33% from the cyclical peak of 100.25 points (2011-09-05), and up 60.62% from the lowest point of 42.86 on December 09, 2015. (Note: Period refers to 2011-09-01 to date).

II. Market Analysis

Domestic market: The spot tin market continued to fall under the influence of futures in early July. After Shanghai and Tin fell to the drop stop on July 2, the night market fell again near the drop stop, hitting a new low since October 2016, touching 127780 yuan/ton at one time, falling 14840 points in two days, with a decline of 10.2%. Lunsey was the lowest at $17585, down 6.43% on the day. The spot market fell by about 4%. With the stable fluctuation of the futures market, the overall fundamentals of the spot market did not have much impact. It was still in the situation of weak supply and demand. At the end of the month, the domestic mainstream spot tin price was about 134000-136000 yuan/ton, with an average price of 135000 yuan/ton. The spot lifting interval remained stable, with a set of Yunxi lifting water of 1000-1500 yuan/ton, an ordinary Yunzi lifting water of 500-1200 yuan/ton and a small brand lifting water of 400-800 yuan/ton.

Import and Export: On July 5, Indonesia’s Ministry of Trade said that its export of refined tin increased 36% to 7,620.9 tons in June from a year earlier, 13% from 6,759.26 tons last month. Indonesia exported 5,608.82 tons of refined tin in the same period last year. Indonesia is currently the world’s largest exporter of refined tin.

Data released by the World Bureau of Metal Statistics (WBMS) on July 17 show that the global tin supply gap in January-May 2019 is 0.4 million tons. The total reported inventory was 0.69 million tons higher than at the end of 2018, but that included 0.6 million tons. Indonesia’s unexplained increase in stockpiles resulted in a decline of 33,300 tons in global refined tin production from January to May 2018. Asia’s output fell by 44,000 tons year-on-year. China’s apparent demand fell 1.7% year on year. Global tin demand in January-May 2019 was 157,700 tons, down 0.3% from the same period last year. Japan’s consumption was 11.4 million tons, down 3.6% from the same period last year. In May 2019, the output of refined tin was 31,000 tons and the consumption was 30,300 tons.

Data released by the Beijing Branch of the International Tin Association (ITA) show that China’s refined tin production in the first half of 2019 decreased by about 10% from a year earlier to about 75,000 tons. ITA’s survey of 15 refineries in China showed that the output of tin refining in June was about 12,500 tons, a 9% decrease in ring-to-ring ratio and the same ratio. China is the leading tin producer. Cui Lin, ITA’s chief representative for China, said that the decline in tin refining production was due to the reduced supply of tin concentrates in Myanmar and weak demand in China. Tin futures prices in Shanghai have fallen by nearly 8% since the beginning of the year, to about 134,000 yuan per ton. Cui said prices below $140,000 would affect production because of the high cost of ore supply in Myanmar.

Domestic events:

An executive of PT Timah, Indonesia’s largest tin miner, said on Thursday July 25 that the company expects to more than double its tin refining output this year, but the company has begun to take steps to reduce production. Timah’s refined tin production is expected to reach about 70,000 tons this year, according to Alwin Albar, Timah’s operations director. Last year, the government amended the rules to allow the company to obtain production from illegal miners within its concession. “We are actually trying to brake when the tin market is depressed,” Albar said in an interview. Timah produced 33,444 tons of refined tin in 2018, according to company data.

3. Prospects for the Future Market

Due to the low replenishment of downstream enterprises in the early stage, the recent turnover is less, the downstream purchasing intention is weakened, and the global trade frictions continue under the general environment, the demand has not improved. It is expected that the future market will be dominated by low consolidation.