Nickel/China has plenty of refined, but much less scrap

摘要

Leaving aside laterite ores, which are bottled up by low nickel prices and rising process costs, how well stocked is China? This has to be one of today's critical questions for the nickel market. At a time when consumption rose just 18 percent net imports of finished nickel for first half 2008 were no less than 54 percent ahead of last year. This has naturally left a residue in the hands of merchants and big consumers such as Tisco, which has term contracts with Cuba.