LME nickel price rises back on Jan 17
The three-month futures price of nickel on the London Metal Exchange (LME) rose back by US$135/ton to US$13,910/ton last Friday (January 17th). The highest in intraday sessions was US$13,985/tons, and the spot price also hiked by US$136/ton to US$13,836/ton.
Meanwhile, LME’s market inventory of nickel had a first increase this month, with a small reduction by 78 tons, reaching 182,934 tons. The cumulative increase in January was 32,244 tons.
According to market participants, stainless steel downstream mills increased their purchase of stainless steel, and the market inventories didn’t rise further, both of which caused a bounce in nickel prices.
Due to restraint in Chinese ferronickel production in the short term, it was expected that the nickel prices will keep stable if the market inventories didn’t grow in the future.
