The global aluminum market will be more balanced this year and could shift into a supply deficit by 2013 as new projects fail to keep the pace with high-cost capacity cuts this year, Rio Tinto Alcan's Chief Executive said Tuesday.
"Supply will become more challenging ... the market will be near a balance this year," Jacynthe Cote said at American Metal Market's Aluminum Summit in New York.
"If you look at the supply side, year-over-year, there's been virtually zero growth given what has been added versus what has been taken out."
Many higher-cost smelters in the 40-million-tonne-per-year market have struggled to remain profitable after prices plunged almost a third in the past 12 months, to below $2,000 per tonne.
On Tuesday, aluminum hit December lows, roiled by concerns over sluggish demand and high inventories.
Three-month prices on the London Metal Exchange were at $1,960 per tonne on Tuesday, close to or below many plants' breakeven level.
With power accounting for a third of production costs, smelters with long-term steady energy contracts or cheap hydroelectric power can survive the current turmoil.
But many have divested or shut expensive production.
Rio Tinto Plc plans to sell 13 assets across six countries, including smelters and alumina refineries worth an estimated $8 billion.
U.S. producer Alcoa Inc. has said it is taking a hard look at the cost profile of its Point Henry smelter, having already announced the shutdown of about 500,000 tonnes of annual capacity at the start of the year.
Norsk Hydro shut its 180,000-tonne per year Kurri Kurri smelter, both in Australia.
"So we are getting closer to a near balanced market. If that trend continues, we could be in a slight deficit next year and the following year because all of the projects are being delayed now," Cote said.
Even so, while producers make cut-backs, many are replacing it with capacity in low-cost regions such as the Middle East.
Alcoa is building its Ma'aden smelter in Saudi Arabia which will open next year and produce 740,000 tonnes per year of aluminum. Many traders say they are also concerned that Chinese output remains high even with the falling prices.
And while Cote sees a long-term supply challenge, demand outlook, primarily from China, is a bright prospect.
"I can't prevent myself from being pretty positive about China," Cote said.
China's move last week to cut interest rates for the first time since the depths of the global financial crisis was another sign that the world's leading metals consumer "will continue to track their growth in a very responsible way", Cote said.
"China is still going to grow at near 8 percent this year," she said. "The aluminum demand will probably be near 9 percent this year ... it's growing in the single digits, but it's growing from a much larger base than 10 years ago."
Over the next 5 to 10 years, 70 percent of aluminum supply will come from China and close to 25 percent will come from the Middle East, she said.
Talk of a supply deficit may also surprise those who see record stockpiles of almost 5 million tonnes in LME-bonded warehouses, with another 4-5 million tonnes estimated to be in off-exchange storage, as a sign of massive oversupply.
But much of that material, which started building in 2007 as the global economy deteriorated and demand fell, is not immediately available as it is held in financing deals, traders say.
In those deals, the owner of the metal agree to keep the material in storage for months and often years at a time in return for cheap rent.
They make a profit because their metal is gaining in value due to the contango on the LME, with forward prices at a premium to cash.
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