Copper Scrap Market Price Likely to Rebound in Japan

Copper scrap market price hit bottom and showed sign of rebound around Osaka on Friday. JX Nippon Mining & Metals’ selling price of electrolytic copper ingot, the indicator for domestic copper scrap trades, is likely to rebound by 40,000-50,000 yen on Tuesday from 780,000 yen per tonne as of Friday. The backgrounds are that overseas copper market prices continued to surge on Thursday while yen exchange rate against US dollar steeply weakened on Friday. Scrap dealers showed intentions to raise their purchasing prices but scrap collectors were in wait-and-see mood as of Friday.

With current conditions, theoretical copper ingot selling price by JX Nippon Mining & Metals is estimated at 826,000-827,000 yen per tonne. Scrap dealers expect the indicator would be revised up on Tuesday.

There were few scrap selling offers against scrap dealers as of Friday since scrap collectors seemed to have expectation for scrap price upsurge. Scrap collectors hold few inventories those which were procured at high price. Some of scrap dealers showed an intention to raise purchasing price for copper based scrap by around 30 yen per kilogram on Friday, for instance, paying 710-715 yen per kg for no.1 copper wire scrap. However, there was no actual trading at the high price level.

Brass scrap market price is also likely to rebound by about 20 yen per kg though Mitsui Mining & Smelting revised down its electrolytic zinc selling price on Thursday, the domestic indicator. However, actual market price leveled off on Friday at 480-490 yen per kg for new cutting brass scrap and 450-460 yen per kg for brass turning scrap.

Around Tokyo, market price of No.1 copper wire scrap was around 690-700 yen per kg with potential increase on Friday. There are very few scrap trades in the market due to infrastructure confusions after Tohoku-Kanto Earthquake. Additionally, on Friday, there were few scrap selling offers when market price was likely to upturn.