Chinese ferrovanadium market continues its weak sliding trend

Given the supply shortage of molybdenum concentrate, most miners in China have raised their ex-works offers for this material, resulting in a steady rise in the Chinese domestic ferromolybdenum market over the past week. Meanwhile, China's domestic ferrovanadium market has continued to slip. Although the international ferrovanadium market has been indicating an upward trend, most players are still pessimistic as regards the outlook for the international market in the coming period.

China's domestic molybdenum alloys market was characterized by a continuous climbing trend throughout the past week. By the end of last week, the mainstream prices of ferromolybdenum in Jingzhou were still in the range of RMB 118,000-120,000/mt ($17,302-17,595/mt), while the market prices of molybdenum concentrate (45 percent) were around RMB 1,750-1,800/mtu ($257-263/mtu). Meanwhile, the European market still maintained its rising trend. Currently, European market prices of ferromolybdenum (60 percent Mo) are up slightly to $26-27/kg Mo, while prices of molybdenum oxide in this market are around $10.1-10.6/lb.

Continuing its positive performance, the Chinese ferromolybdenum market has posted strong demand for molybdenum concentrate in recent days. On account of the increasing demand for molybdenum concentrate, some mines in Henan Province and Liaoning Province have hiked their quotations to the level of RMB 1,800/mt ($263/mt) or so. Looking at the current situation, there is still room available for further ascension in the domestic molybdenum concentrate market. In addition, with the ferromolybdenum market remaining on a rising trend, the Chinese mills have also raised their purchase prices to the range of 115,000-118,000/mt ($16,837-17,302/mt).

The Chinese vanadium alloys market continued its soft trend over the past week, while a minor rise was observed in the international market. At present, domestic quotations of ferrovanadium (50 percent) are down by RMB 2,000-3,000/mt ($293-439/mt) to the range of RMB 93,000-96,000/mt ($13,616-14,056/mt), with vanadium pentoxide (98 percent flakes) remaining unchanged at RMB 88,000-90,000/mt ($12,884-13,177/mt). Meanwhile, in the international market, quotations of vanadium pentoxide (98 percent flakes) in Europe have remained constant at $3.8-4.5/lb, while market quotations of ferrovanadium (V70-80%) are up by €0.5-1/kg to €22.5-23.5/kg.

Still characterized by slack demand, China's domestic ferrovanadium market registered a minor reduction in mainstream quotations over the past week. Generally speaking, domestic ferrovanadium prices are expected to continue their weak performance in the short term. On the raw material side, prices of vanadium pentoxide in the domestic market at one point even dropped to the level of RMB 87,000/mt ($12,738/mt) in the past week. However, due to the price rebound in the international market, most Chinese producers have seemed reluctant to sell their materials at low levels. At present, the downstream ferrovanadium producers are still in wait-and-see mode, not eager to make purchases of raw materials in significant quantity for the time being. Although the international market has shown upward movement in recent days, most players are still pessimistic as regards the outllook for the ferrovanadium market in the future. Given the continuing sluggishness of demand and and the difficult sales situation in the international ferrovanadium market, market quotations of ferrovanadium in Europe are likely to decline in the coming period.