Japan Secondary Al alloy Output Marks First Drop in 33 Months

Japanese secondary aluminum and alloy production was 93,989 tonnes in April, down by 1.2% year-on-year, announced by Japan Aluminium Alloy Refiners Association. The production represented year-on-year decrease for the first time since July 2005. The shipment declined by 1.7% to 94,005 tonnes in April from a year earlier, which showed year-on-year down for 2 months in a row.Domestic production of aluminium die castings keeps steady. The output was 99,863 tonnes in March, up by 0.2% year-on-year, and appeared to maintain the firm level in April. Japanese die casting makers, the largest consumer of secondary aluminium alloy, seemed to decrease consumption of Japanese secondary aluminium alloy while increased the procurement from overseas when the yen exchange became stronger.On the other hand, Japanese automakers have decreased their production of knockdown sets for export since car market became weak in North America. Some of Japanese secondary aluminium makers have decreased the ingot output to follow the trend. With these backgrounds, the output growth of secondary aluminium alloy slowed down.