MI aluminium stocks analysis: LME up on week

LME-registered stocks of primary aluminium rose by a net 2,725t last week after two consecutive weeks of net declines (cumulative total was 7,175t).

That was down to an acceleration in inflow to 10,550t from 7,275t the previous week and 3,400t in the week prior to that.
Singapore received metal every day last week, the cumulative total coming in at 2,500t. Bilbao featured warrantings over Wednesday-Friday totalling 2,000t—the first time this Spanish location has held LME-registered aluminium since July last year.

Metal continues to seep onto warrant in the US, where physical premiums remain depressed and consumer off-take low. Baltimore received 1,825t, Detroit 2,575t, Long Beach 1,300t and New Orleans 350t.

It's not all one-way traffic in the US, though, with Detroit, New Orleans and St Louis all losing modest amounts of metal on a daily basis. Note also that NYMEX-warranted stocks edged down by 89 tons to 19,166 tons (17,387 metric), while off-warrant stocks fell further to 26,890 pieces, now down by 107,808 since the start of the year.

In Europe, the most consistent faller among LME locations is Trieste, where metal continues to trickle off the board after the May 29 cancellation of all the registered tonnage (17,725t) at the Italian location. It lost another 2,250t last week but still holds 12,600t of cancelled warrants.

As such, it is the largest concentration of cancelled tonnage in the LME system, followed by Singapore with 7,400t. The overall ratio of cancelled tonnage, however, remains at a less than exciting 3.8%, which works against any sustained acceleration in "out" side activity apart from at those two locations.