Russian aluminium exports down in Q1 07

Russian exports of aluminium totalled 900,400t in the first quarter of this year, representing a 23.4% decline from the year-earlier period (Q1 06), when 1,174,600t of metal were exported.
Exports have been on a medium-term up trend for several years—up 9.6% last year and up 5.7% in 2005—and we’d be wary of reading too much into this year-on-year decline in the first few months of 2007.
Monthly export volumes from Russia tend to be volatile and there was a similar slide in first-quarter shipments in 2005 before a reversion to the underlying up trend.