Photo by: Bloomberg
VANCOUVER (miningweekly.com) – The world's refined copper deficit has increased to 160 000 t for the first seven months of 2017, as refined copper supply has stagnated, according to the International Copper Study Group (ICSG).
The Lisbon-based think tank said the July deficit was in fact the lowest recorded so far this year, at 35 000 t, despite a 0.5% decline in refined copper use to 13 690 t, as scrap supplies improved and constrained use growth globally. This was significantly more than the six-month copper balance that showed a deficit of 75 000 t.
In the first seven months of 2017, the world refined copper balance, adjusted for changes in Chinese bonded stocks, indicated a deficit of about 90 000 t, up from a deficit of about 5 000 t reported last month.
According to ICSG data, world copper mine production fell 2% year-on-year to 11 381 t in the seven months since January, with concentrate production declining by around 1.5% and solvent extraction-electrowinning (SX-EW) production declining by around 4.5%.
The decline in world mine output was mainly because of a 7%, or 225 000 t, copper decline in output in Chile, the world’s biggest copper-producing country, which was negatively affected by the strike at the Escondida mine and lower output from Codelco mines. The ICSG also fingered a decline in Canada and Mongolia concentrates output of 22% and 19%, respectively, mainly owing to lower grades in planned mining sequencing.
World refined output was estimated to have remained unchanged in the first seven months of 2017 at 13 527 t, with primary SX-EW production declining by 1.5% and secondary production (from scrap) increasing by 10%. The increased availability of scrap allowed secondary refined production to increase, notably in China, while the main contributor to growth was China at 6.5%, followed by India (7%) and some European Union countries recovering from maintenance shutdowns in 2016.
However, overall growth was offset by an 11% decline in Chile, the second-largest refined copper producer, where both primary electrolytic refined production and electrowinning production declined.