European antimony market weakens further

Believing antimony market should be balanced in the range of USD5,000-5,500/t, European market participants expect antimony metal price to fall further.
A consumer told Asian Metal that the offers of antimony is at around USD5,600/t CIF Rotterdam, and he thinks price will continue to fall as the consumers are not buying at high price. Moreover, the reason for the higher prices is the bad weather and holiday, and now the problems are already solved, so production in china is back to normal.
He takes that the antimony price should frustrate in the range of USD5,200-5,600/t, which can satisfy the Chinese supplier and not drive the consumer of antimony trioxide away. "Market will always be balance as the result of demand. If the price is too high, then the end-users will switch to alternatives."
A trader source disclosed that Chinese offers are in the range of USD5,700-5,900/t CIF Rotterdam; prices decreased in the last few weeks, but demand remains weak that the consumers are not interested in buying.
The source is confused by the current market. He holds that there is little material in warehouse Rotterdam, plus Chinese and European currency are appreciation against USD, however, the price of antimony kept in the range of USD5,000-5,500/t in the passed year and it falls back to the level every time Chinese suppliers tried to push the price to USD6,000/t. "The European consumers did a good job to keep the price down," said the source.

 
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