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This morning in metal news, a new report paints a positive picture for jobs in the renewables sector, Moody’s downgrades China’s credit rating, and the results of the OPEC meeting are in. The current supply cuts will be extended for another nine months, and oil prices tumbled on the news.

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OPEC Agrees on 9-Month Extension of Supply Cuts

Let’s start with the big headline of the morning. As expected, the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) has agreed to extend supply cuts for another nine months, until March 2018.

After OPEC wrapped up its first meeting in Vienna around 3:30pm CEDT (8:30am CDT), oil prices responded over the next few hours by sliding 4.5% to $51.60 per barrel. Some industry analysts think OPEC should have agreed to deeper cuts. As The Guardian reported, OPEC is “sticking to the 1.8 [million] barrel a deal first agreed in late November.” Russia and other oil producing non-OPEC members are also expected to go along with the supply cuts.

Forget Bringing Back Coal Jobs

The burgeoning renewable energy sector employed 9.8 million people in 2016, according to the latest annual report released by the International Renewable Energy Agency (IRENA). Global employment in the sector has been growing every year since 2013, and there may be as many as 24 million renewables workers worldwide by 2030. Read more

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You should credit them for trying. As one of the first foreign multinationals to invest in the Indian market, General Motors has been persevering for over 20 years.

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This month, however, it has finally pulled the plug, announcing that it will stop making cars in India for the Indian market by the end of this year. That doesn’t mean it will cease all manufacturing. Although the firm has already stopped its production in Gujarat, it will continue with its manufacturing foundry at Talegoaon in Maharashtra, making parts and cars for export to the Asian and South American markets.

As part of a wider re-structuring aimed at improving profitability, the BBC reported, GM has put a $1 billion investment plan for India on hold, while also pulling back in South and East Africa. The firm plans to sell a 57.7% shareholding and grant management control to Isuzu in its East African operations, as well as stop selling cars in South Africa and sell its Struandale plant there to the Japanese firm in a re-structuring aimed at creating savings of $100 million per annum.

To be fair, minor successes aside, GM has struggled in India and failed to make much impact on a market originally dominated by domestic brands but latterly by Japanese and Korean firms. Even after more than 20 years, GM’s Chevrolet brand only has 1% of the market.

Commenting on the earlier plan to invest $1 billion in the market to develop its product range in what is forecast to become the world’s third largest car market, GM’s International president Stefan Jacoby is quoted as saying, “We determined that the increased investment required for an extensive and flexible product portfolio would not deliver a leadership position or long-term profitability in the domestic market.” Read more

This morning in metals news, the strike at Freeport McRoRan’s Grasberg copper mine was extended for a second month, oil prices rose in expectation of supply cuts, and silver prices reached a three-week high.

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Freeport Indonesia Strike Extended

This past Saturday, the union representing thousands of workers at Freeport’s Grasberg copper mine in Papua, Indonesia announced that the ongoing strike will be extended beyond May 30, Reuters reported. As union industrial relations officer Tri Puspital told Reuters, “We will extend the strike for 30 more days.” Approximately 9,000 workers are participating in the strike.

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The reason for the strike revolves around employment. Last month, Freeport laid off about 10% of its 32,000 workers to cut costs, which accrued to the tune of millions thanks to an ongoing dispute with the Indonesian government over rights to the Grasberg mine. “With this problematic combination of protests from workers and tensions with the Indonesian government,” wrote MetalMiner analyst Raul de Frutos earlier this month, “it’s no wonder that investors are concerned about further supply disruptions this year.” It looks like supply disruptions will continue.

A Key Week for Oil

One hopes that this will be the only time when news source after news source mentions Saudi Arabia and glowing orbs in the same headline. In more important news, Bloomberg reported yesterday that Saudi Arabia has received Iraq’s support to extend oil output cuts for nine months, after Saudi Minister of Energy Khalid Al-Falih flew to Baghdad to talk to Jabar al-Luaibi, his Iraqi counterpart. Read more

This doubtful week, a Stanford economist made the bold proclamation that electric vehicles will completely displace their petrol and diesel counterparts by 2025, and India’s plan to triple steel production by 2030 was met with more than a few raised eyebrows.

Grand Plans

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Speaking of India, its ascent as a promising market for renewable energy has been truly impressive. Consultancy EY recently published its 2017 Renewable Energy Country Attractiveness Index (RECAI), and India took the number two spot, beating out the U.S., which slipped to third place.

India had been number nine in 2013, before Narendra Modi, who views developing renewable energy to wean India off coal as a top priority, became prime minister. Modi aims to boost India’s renewables capacity to 175 GW by 2022 (currently capacity stands at 57 GW).

India has similarly high ambitions for steel, as Sohrab Darabshaw reported earlier this week. The country aims to triple its steel production capacity by 2030, which would mean adding 182 million tons of capacity. Read more

Macro photo of a piece of lead ore

The International Lead and Zinc Study Group released its Spring 2017 Meetings/Forecasts, which found that global demand for refined lead metal will increase 2.3% this year to 11.39 million tons.

The main reason? Further development in Chinese usage, which is projected to grow 4.3%.

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The ILZSG report states: “After increasing by a robust 9.8% in 2016, usage of lead metal in Europe is expected to remain unchanged in 2017. A stable outlook is also foreseen in Japan and the Republic of Korea. In both India and the United States modest growth of 1.5% is predicted.”

Lead Supply Update

Furthermore, the ILZSG report states that global lead mine production is projected to increase 4.3% to 4.92 million tons this year, due in part to growth in China and increases in Canada, Mexico, India, Greece and Kazakhstan. Read more

As I pointed out two weeks ago, U.S. steel prices had no choice but to decline as the spread between U.S. and international prices had widened to unsustainable levels.

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That’s exactly what I’ve seen so far in May, and I suspect that the recent price decline is just the beginning of a deeper correction that could easily extend to the rest of the second quarter.

U.S. hot-rolled coil prices fall in May. Source: MetalMiner IndX

Hot-rolled prices have fallen around 5% since they peaked in April. Meanwhile, steel prices in China have started to stabilize after a slump during March/April. As the chart below shows, the price spread appears to have peaked near the same levels as it did last summer. U.S. steel prices will likely continue to fall, bringing this price arbitrage down.

Hot rolled coil price spread US vs China. Source: MetalMiner IndX

U.S. Steel Imports Hit a Two-Year High

Although the U.S. doesn’t import steel directly from China, Chinese steel prices set the floor for international prices. Therefore, when China’s steel prices fall, imports become more appealing to U.S. buyers. That’s exactly what’s happening now. In March, U.S. steel imports rose 31% year-over-year, hitting the highest level since May 2015. Read more

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This morning in metals news, we have the latest rankings of promising renewables markets from EY, a continued decline in U.S. oil supply, and a weaker U.S. dollar.

The Renewables Race

China and India took the top spots on consultancy EY’s 2017 Renewable Energy Country Attractiveness Index (RECAI), edging past the United States, which had fallen from first to third place. The downward shift for the U.S. is largely due to the expected demise of the Clean Power Plan.

Free Download: The May 2017 MMI Report

Since taking office in 2014, India’s prime minister Narendra Modi has been nothing but ambitious in his plans to reduce the country’s dependency on coal and ramp up renewable energy capacity. India’s current renewables capacity stands at 57 GW, and Modi’s plan is to reach 175 GW by 2022, including 100 GW of solar. Read more

The International Lead and Zinc Study Group (ILZSG) recently released its annual demand/supply forecast for the zinc market.

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The group anticipates global demand for refined zinc to be greater than supply in 2017, keeping zinc markets in a deficit for a second consecutive year. The ILZSG predicts a deficit of 226,000 tonnes, not much different from the deficit recorded last year.

Global refined zinc metal balance. Source: MetalMiner analysis of ILZSG data

Given these numbers, you could assume that prices have no other option but to go up. However, despite a projected deficit, I’m starting to doubt zinc’s ability to climb much above today’s levels. Indeed, high prices are simply what could play against zinc’s rally. Zinc has more than doubled in price since the beginning of 2016, and investors now seem unwilling to chase prices above $3,000/mt, a level that has acted as a ceiling for prices this year. Read more

There have been some doubts over India’s stated plans to triple its steel production capacity by 2030. The Indian cabinet recently passed a revamped policy to the extent.

While some have welcomed the document, other sector experts have expressed uncertainty over the projections in the policy.

Free Download: The May 2017 MMI Report

Ratings agency Crisil, for example, said in a statement that the ambition to add 182 million tons of new steel capacities over the next 14 years under the National Steel Policy was unlikely to be achieved. Crisil’s doubts seem logical. After all, India has managed to add capacity at the annual rate of 55 million tons in the last decade.

The National Steel Policy 2017 projects crude steel production capacity of 300 million tons by 2030-31 from the present level of about 120 million tons and per-capita consumption of 158 kilograms of finished steel as against the current consumption of 61 kilograms. The policy also sees an increase in domestic availability of washed coking coal by 2030-31.

Crisil Research said that it expects 24-26 million tons of steel capacities to be added over the next five years, leading to aggregate steel capacity to rise to 140-145 million tons by 2021-22. Beyond this, Crisil said, the key factors that would determine the pace of capacity addition would be demand growth, continued government support, and pricing environment against the backdrop of global overcapacity led by China. Crisil has also projected a 6-6.5% growth in steel demand in India over the next five years, lower than the 7% annual growth rate projected by the government till 2030. Read more

Manufacturing activity in the U.S. continues to be strong, as ISM’s PMI reported expansion in April for the 95th straight month.

Economic growth in China is seemingly gangbusters — last quarter, the country’s annual GDP growth rate clocked in at 6.9%, its highest rate since Q3 2015.

And, the U.S. dollar recently fell to a five-year low — the dollar usually experiences an inverse relationship with commodity prices, but has bucked that trend over the last month.

But most industrial metal prices have fallen off — so what gives?

MetalMiner just released the May 2017 edition of our Monthly MMI Report, in which we analyze 10 baskets of metals by metal vertical and end-use industries — tracing a line through steel, grain-oriented electrical steel (GOES), stainless, base metals (aluminum, copper, nickel), and rare earths, to the automotive, renewables and construction sectors.

Within the report, we give metal buyers more insight into what’s happening with these price trends, and what’s going on behind the scenes.

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