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Living off scraps

November 20, 2009 - 00:00 GMT

The non-ferrous scrap market in the USA is slow and uneven at the moment, although exports to China have been buoyant recently. Supply and demand are both down, but seem to be broadly balanced, reports Myra Pinkham.

The North American non-ferrous scrap market has been fairly tight for the past few months. “This isn’t necessarily because demand from consumers is up,” says Bob Stein, vice-president of nonferrous marketing for Alter Trading, St. Louis. “It is more of a supply issue.” It is generally believed that a bottom has been reached in both the US and global economies, and that a recovery – albeit a slow one – from the depths of a very severe recession has begun. Bob Garino, director of commodities for the Washington-based Institute of Scrap Recycling Industries (Isri), notes that several economic reports have supported this, including a number of regional surveys of the US Federal Reserve Bank (FRB) and the Institute of Supply Management (ISM) purchasing managers’ manufacturing index. The purchasing managers’ manufacturing index, for example, was 52.6% in September – the second consecutive month that it registered greater than 50%, denoting economic...

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