GLOBAL VANADIUM WRAP: Chinese Vanadium Prices Stabilize; European Market Continues Downtrend
The decline in the Chinese ferro-vanadium export price came to a halt last week after finding support from a firm domestic market and improved sentiment. Meanwhile, the European ferro-vanadium market continued its downward trend amid aggressive competition among sellers.
- Chinese ferro-vanadium price stabilizes on firm offers
- European ferro-vanadium price slides again due to aggressive offers
- Chinese V2O5 price steady; European price rolled over
- US ferro-vanadium price continues descent
The export price for ferro-vanadium in China stabilized in the week ended Friday April 19, despite low levels of trading activity.
Fastmarkets’ assessment for the export price for ferro-vanadium, min 78%, fob China, stood at $50-54 per kg on April 18, unchanged from a week earlier, after falling by 30.7% since February 28.
Chinese ferro-vanadium exporters were reluctant to cut their offers significantly last week after realizing that with the widening price spread between the domestic and European markets, it’s unlikely to see any deals concluded in the export market at the time, market sources said.
In addition, many Chinese ferro-vanadium exporters have been lured back to the domestic market after noticing that the domestic price has been much more favorable than that in the international market and the domestic market has demonstrated signs of stabilizing, market sources added.
“It’s hard to see any trade [in the export market] especially when the price spread between the Chinese and European markets has widened to nearly $10 per kg now,” a Chinese ferro-vanadium exporter said. “Therefore, it’s unsurprising that many are focusing on the domestic market now.”
The ferro-vanadium price in China’s domestic market halted its downtrend over the past week because domestic suppliers had held their price quotations relatively firm after successfully shrugging off some of their stock pressure, Fastmarkets understands.
“This month [April] has seen several tenders released by mills so far, which has effectively helped domestic [both ferro-vanadium and vanadium nitrogen] producers reduce some stocks,” a China-based market source said.
“The monthly [vanadium pentoxide (V2O5)] price by three major producers also gave domestic [ferro-vanadium] producers some leverage to hold their prices stable this week,” the above source added. “The current price barely enabled them to cover their costs, so they were unwilling to lower prices further.”
China’s three major V2O5 producers – Tranvic Group, Desheng Group and Hebei Chengde Jianlong Co – set their monthly price for April at 170,000 yuan ($25,329) per tonne on April 10, an equivalent of approximately $11.50 per lb, according to market sources. This was down from the previous month’s price of 220,000 yuan per tonne. Both are paid on acceptance and include value-added tax.
Upstream, the export price for V2O5 in China was similarly unmoved amid a lack of liquidity last week.
Fastmarkets’ price assessment for V2O5, min 98%, fob China, stood at $10.50-11.50 per lb on April 18, unchanged from a week before.
Chinese domestic V2O5 exporters showed little interest in offering in the export market last week amid few inquiries from abroad.
