Strategic Metal Report

Chinese Regulators Concerned About Irregularities at the Fanya Metal Exchange

The limited number of postings made on SM Report so far this year is fairly reflective of the lack of newsworthy events impacting the minor and electronic metal markets.

With readily available material and limited spot deals, gallium and germanium prices have effectively been pegged for months. Indium, meanwhile, which soared in 2013 on the back of the Fanya Metal Exchange's enormous purchase announcements, has seen prices level off for most of 2014 despite continuing, incredible weekly purchases by the Exchange.

The monotony may have come to an end this week with a report published - albeit temporarily - on the China Securities Regulatory Commission website that explicitly named the Fanya Metal Exchange as an area of very high concern.

(Note: the original article has now been taken off the website, but a .pdf version, with English translation, is available at the bottom of this posting).

According to the report, which appears to summarize the minutes from a recent meeting regarding the Yunnan Stock Exchange Tidying and Reorganization Project, spot inspections of the Fanya Metal Exchange uncovered "irregularities" in the organization's operations, that risk stemming from the Exchange is "very large" and that immediate corrective action should be taken.

Coverage from Minor Metals & Rare Earths 2010 - Xiamen, China [Part II: Minor Metals]

A wide range of reports were presented at Metal Pages’ Minor Metals & Rare Earths conference this year, which not only covered a variety of metals, but also included perspectives from privately held and publicly traded producers, exploration and development companies, as well as research organizations.

Two presentations specifically examined the current indium market. Growing use in liquid crystal display (LCD) and cadmium-indium-gallium-selenide (CIGS) photovoltaic applications have attracted much attention to the indium market over the past five years. Feng Yuncong, from the Antaike research group, however, expressed doubt about any large indium price increases in the near future due to the high number of large-scale producers that are capable of extracting at high recovery rates. Claire Mikolajczak, Director of Metals and Chemicals at Indium Corp., discussed the effect of the flat panel display (FPD) industry on indium demand. Currently accounting for about 56 percent of indium demand, according to Ms. Mikolajczak, the FPD market is the primary driver of indium prices. Moreover, although the LCD growth rate is decreasing, it still remains strong and demand for indium continues to be supported by growth in the photovoltaic cell (PV), CIGS and light-emitting diode (LED) industries. Consequently, some estimates have world demand for indium nearly doubling over the next decade. However, despite strong end-use growth estimates, most in the industry believe production can keep pace over the long-term, leaving only temporary periods of price volatility