Strong demand from China
China’s economy began to restart last year far ahead of the rest of the world, which was still feeling the economic impact of Covid-19 shutdowns. Stimulus measures taken by Beijing to counteract the earlier effects of the pandemic have in turn led to steady demand for steel and ferro-alloy products, including manganese flake and tungsten.
The ammonium paratungstate (APT) market has been moving up since the beginning of the year and
tungsten APT 88.5% WO3 min cif Rotterdam and Baltimore duty-free is now trading at $270-275 per metric tonne unit, according to Fastmarkets’ latest assessment on March 19, its strongest since May 2019,
amid a pick-up in end-user demand.
“This has been a good quarter so far in terms of demand. Appetite for hard metal remains healthy and the strength in the market will continue until the second quarter, keeping prices firm,” a...
