Metals Market:
As of today's day close, the domestic base metals were mixed, Shanghai lead and tin rose about 2.60%, Shanghai zinc rose 0.63%, alumina fell 1.64%, and other metals fell below 1.00%. Among them, the Shanghai lead brush has reached a new high of 18,860 yuan/ton since November 5, 2018.
As of 15:12 today, London tin rose 2.65%, London copper, lead and zinc rose nearly 1.50%, and London aluminum and nickel rose about 0.60%.
Lithium carbonate and industrial silicon fell 3.10% and 0.80% respectively, of which lithium carbonate hit a new low of 101,650 yuan/ton since February 27, 2024, falling for six consecutive years. Manganese and silicon mainly brushed a new high of 9,192 yuan/ton since November 4, 2021 yesterday, and then weakened and closed down 5.07%. Today's decline has expanded, falling 7.73% at one point during the session and closing down 7.10%.
The black series all closed down, iron ore fell 1.55%, bifocals fell nearly 1.30%, and other metals fell below 1.00%.
Shanghai gold and silver rose about 0.60%. As of 15:12 today, COMEX gold and silver rose 0.22% and 0.66% respectively.
Today, the main line of European line container transportation continued to rise, brushing a record high of 4038.0, closing up 2.98%.
As of 15:12 today
Spot & Fundamentals
Lead:
SMM believes that the rise is mainly due to the intensification of contradictions on the raw material side after May Day, especially the implementation of the "reverse invoicing" policy for waste batteries, the reduction of short-term recycling volume and the rise in tax costs. At the same time, the shortage of lead concentrate and waste batteries at the raw material end has boosted lead prices, which is also the main driving force for lead prices to continue to break through new highs. And in terms of consumption, with the recent rise in lead prices, the production cost of batteries has risen, such as electric bicycle battery companies have successively released price increase news, consumer prices have begun to appear normal transmission, and the follow-up may be expected to boost the orders of battery companies.
Tin:
According to SMM research, the price of Shanghai tin was high sideways in early trading today, and trading companies responded that there were fewer customers inquiring in the morning, and most of the trading companies responded that they were scattered transactions in the morning. Overall, today's spot market transactions are relatively deserted.
In terms of lithium carbonate:
SMM's spot price of battery-grade lithium carbonate on the day was 105,000-110,500 yuan/ton, with an average price of 107,750 yuan/ton, a decrease of 1,500 yuan/ton from the previous working day.
In terms of silicon-manganese:
According to the SMM spot price, the average spot price of silicon-manganese 6517 (acceptance) in Inner Mongolia has been flat in the past two days after rising for 6 consecutive days, and is reported at 8200 yuan/ton today. In terms of manganese ore, according to SMM analysis, in the medium term, the supply gap of manganese ore has become an established fact, but the short-term market sentiment fluctuates greatly, and domestic manganese miners continue to raise prices, although the increase has narrowed. In the long run, the tight supply of manganese ore may be alleviated.
Macroscopic
On the US dollar:
Recently, the U.S. dollar index has fluctuated and weakened, falling 0.09% as of 15:12 today. The U.S. Labor Department reported on Tuesday that the final demand producer price index (PPI) rose 0.5% in April, after being revised downwards to a 0.1% decline in March. Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell on Tuesday gave an optimistic assessment of the current state of the U.S. economy, which is expected to continue to grow at an above-trend pace, and confidence in the pullback in inflation remains largely unchanged, albeit due to a decline in recent data.
On May 15, the central parity of the RMB exchange rate in the interbank foreign exchange market was 7.1049 yuan per US dollar per dollar
Domestic:
["No interest rate cut"! On May 15, the central bank announced that the central bank carried out 125 billion yuan of one-year MLF today, with an interest rate of 2.5%. $125 billion of 1-year MLF is due today. On April 15, the central bank announced that the central bank carried out 2 billion yuan of open market reverse repurchase operations and 100 billion yuan of MLF operations today, and the winning interest rates were 1.80% and 2.50% respectively, which were consistent with before.
In terms of data:
Pay attention to the revised annual rate of GDP in the first quarter of the euro area on May 15, the seasonally adjusted quarterly rate of employment in the first quarter of the euro area, the monthly rate of industrial production in the euro area in March, the annual rate of non-seasonally adjusted CPI in April, the monthly rate of seasonally adjusted CPI in April, the monthly rate of retail sales in April, the NAHB housing market index in May, and the monthly rate of business inventories in March.
Crude oil:
As of 15:12 today, U.S. oil and cloth oil rose by about 0.70%. Although there have been continuous geopolitical conflicts since the beginning of this year, there has been no substantial shortage of crude oil spots, and the focus of the market has gradually shifted from geopolitical risks to the implementation intensity and demand support of OPEC's production cuts in the second quarter. Iraq and Kazakhstan both said they would compensate for excess production in the first quarter, with Iraq and Kazakhstan compensating 602,000 b/d and 389,000 b/d, respectively. OPEC's monthly report remained cautious on the demand outlook, keeping the global oil demand growth forecast unchanged at 2.25 million b/d in 2024 and 1.85 million b/d, respectively. At the same time, OPEC has reopened a heated debate on the oil production capacity of its members, with the production capacity of countries such as the United Arab Emirates, Kazakhstan, Iraq, Kuwait and Algeria and the possibility of increasing production next year being assessed, which will be completed by the end of June, with follow-up to be monitored.
Crude oil inventories fell from their highs. API data showed that U.S. crude oil and gasoline were destocked last week, while refined oil inventories edged higher. U.S. API crude inventories fell by 3.104 million barrels in the week ended May 10, beating market expectations for a decline of 1.24 million barrels, compared with an increase of 509,000 barrels in the previous week. Crude oil inventories in Cushing also fell, falling by 601,000 barrels, in contrast to the previous week's increase of 1.339 million barrels. Gasoline inventories fell by 1.269 million barrels, beating expectations for an increase of 280,000 barrels and an increase of 1.46 million barrels in the previous week. Refined oil inventories rose by 349,000 barrels, below expectations of an increase of 811,000 barrels, but the increase was reduced from the previous week's increase of 1.713 million barrels. The API inventory report had a more impact on the oil market as a whole, and after the release of the data in the early morning, international oil prices recovered some of the losses in the day.
Pay attention to the EIA crude oil inventories for the week to May 10 tonight, the EIA Cushing crude oil inventories in Oklahoma for the week to May 10, and the EIA strategic petroleum reserve inventories for the week to May 10.