Switzerland-headquartered international commodities producer and trader Glencore, which operates a chrome joint venture with South Africa’s Merafe Resources, has announced its ferrochrome production results for the fourth quarter and full year of 2020.
Although the company’s output of ferrochrome more than doubled quarter on quarter to 378,000 mt in the fourth quarter, with all smelters having returned to full operation apart from the Lydenburg smelter, the production results still remained down 7.4 percent compared to the same period last year.
Meanwhile, in the full year Glencore’s 79.5 percent share of attributable ferrochrome production fell by 28 percent year on year to 1.029 million mt, chiefly reflecting the South African lockdown and resulting suspension of smelting operations in the second quarter, with a phased restart thereafter.
Amid the current market circumstances, Glencore’s guidance for 2021 is 1.4 million mt of ferrochrome production (plus or minus 30 mt).