Domestic copper and zinc producers including Hindustan Copper Ltd and Hindustan Zinc Ltd have raised their basic selling prices up to 7 per cent effective April 1. Other producers like Birla Copper and Sterlite Industries and Binani Zinc have also revised basic selling prices.
Hindustan Copper Ltd hiked copper products selling provisional prices by about 5 per cent (Rs 11,300 per tonne) for April while the final prices for March are settled up in the range of Rs 1000 - Rs 2000 per tonne across all varieties. |
With this revision, CC rod 8mm is sold at Rs 258,800 (Rs 247,500) per tonne while 11-16mm rod is now quoted at Rs 260,600 (Rs 249,400) per tonne. |
Similarly, CC rod 8mm non-standard surged to Rs 258300 as against Rs 247,000 per tonne in the last revision effective March 1. |
Copper cathode (full) shot up to Rs 253,100 per tonne in the new revision from the previous change of Rs 241,800 per tonne while cathode cut perked up to Rs 254,500 per tonne as compared to Rs 243,200 per tonne in the last revision dated March 1. |
The company also raised its wire bar (full) prices to Rs 260,900 per tonne from Rs 249,600 per tonne on March 1. |
The final prices of copper cc rod 8mm were marginally up by Rs 2,195 to Rs 267,517 per tonne which was mainly attributed to sky rocketting copper prices on the London Metal Exchange (LME). |
Despite huge capacity expansion by its private peers like Sterlite and Birla Copper, Hindustan Copper remained silent on this front. In fact, its production capacity has nosedived, to almost half at 13,000 tonne a year, from about 24,000 tonne a year a few years ago. |
Copper prices on the LME gained $679.5 in March to $5527.5 per tonne due to rising concern of global shortage of supply and breakdown of Chile's Collabuasi Copper concentrator. Surprisingly, inventories also surged 6,650 tonne. Moving in tandem, wire bar rose to Rs 293 per kg from Rs 279 per kg on the March 1 while heavy scrap, armiture, utensil scrap and sheet cutting surged to Rs 275 (Rs 257) a kg, Rs 268 (Rs 251) a kg, Rs 247 (Rs 235) a kg and Rs 261 (Rs 247) a kg respectively. |
Copper users, badly hit with the present rise in prices, anticipated an immediate correction in the international market. |
"The present upwards sentiment solely depends upon speculative and fund buying coupled with supply shortage anticipated this year. Without strong fundamentals this sentiment can not survive for long," argued a trader. |
"Domestic copper players can not afford using copper at such a higher price as the end products users are not prepared to pay higher prices for the products. Therefore, copper users are selling products at lower than their actual cost of production," said Rohit Shah, president, Bombay Metal Exchange. |
On the other hand, domestic virgin and secondary copper products have cheering with the present rise in prices. "Rising international prices strengthens our position in the country and makes the company balance sheet heavy," a producer said. |
The breakdown of a concentrator mill at Chile's Collahuasi copper mine is expected to result in a production shortfall of 7,000-8,000 metric tonnes of contained copper which supported copper prices to lift approximately $500 last week. |
Hindustan Zinc Ltd. has announced yet another hike in zinc selling prices by approximately 7 per cent effective April 1. |
With this hike special high grade surged to Rs 1,40,400 per tonne (ex-Debari/Chanderia) while CGG alloy , high grade zinc and prime western zinc are now quoted at Rs 1,42,200 per tonne, 1,40,200 per tonne and Rs 1,38,400 per tonne respectively. This is the fifth price revision by the company from March 1. |
The special high grade recorded phenomenal growth from the price revision on January 1 at Rs 1,07,300 per tonne. |