Supply constraints push antimony prices to record high
July 4, 2024
By Xiaoying Du Reporter, Technology and Energy Metals, Fastmarkets
An extreme supply shortage since April has led to the sharpest price rally ever recorded in the antimony market since Fastmarkets started pricing the metal back in the early 1980s.
Fastmarkets’ (formerly Metal Bulletin) record of covering antimony prices goes back to January 1980. Its price assessment for antimony max 100 ppm Bi, in-warehouse Rotterdam was at $3,200-3,260 per tonne on 4 January 1980.
Fastmarket-assessed antimony metal prices in Rotterdam increased at their fastest rate in more than 40 years in the week to 17 May 2024 due to a severe supply squeeze after a month of continued extreme shortage of raw materials from China, Russia, and Southeast Asia.
Supply constraints in China
China historically has been the largest producer of antimony in the world, but its mine production has fallen significantly in recent years, with increasing difficulties in accessing depleted mine reserves, problems with maintaining product quality and tighter environmental protection regulations all contributing to rising production costs.
Environmental inspections in China’s key antimony production hub in Hunan from mid-March to the beginning of June — as well as maintenance works across plants in Hunan — have led to production suspensions in the province. In addition, industrial incidents at mines in Hunan and Guizhou had led to mining activity being halted in February and March.
Changing antimony demand in China
One of antimony’s primary uses (accounting for about 50% of consumption) is in the form of antimony trioxide in flame retardants for plastics, textiles and other materials.
But the use of antimony as a clarifying agent in photovoltaic (PV) glass in China is expected to surpass its use in flame-retardants in the very near future. This will change the supply-demand balance, according to Chinese market participants.
Last year, solar PV installations in China reached record levels. Since then, Chinese antimony smelters have focused on processing the raw material into sodium antimonate – which is used in PV glass to improve the efficiency of solar panels, rather than making ingot for conversion into antimony trioxide to be used in flame retardants.
Fastmarkets is hearing that antimony smelters in China are preferring to do business with PV glass makers as they are less price sensitive than antimony ingot buyers. According to smelter sources, PV glass makers have a relatively high tolerance to price increases for antimony, because sodium antimonate only accounts for a small percentage of their total production cost.
“We have seen the sign of cooling down in demand with recent tariffs from the US aiming to reduce imports of Chinese solar PV panels. But this has not panicked the PV sector, because the market is more policy-driven than market-driven,” sources told Fastmarkets, “and the energy transition and the efficiency brought by solar panels and other green energies are supported by the [Chinese] government.”
According to the United States Geological Survey (USGS), total global antimony mine production in 2023 was approximately 83,000 tonnes, with China producing more than 40,000 tonnes, or 48% of the total. In 2022, China’s output was 60,000 tonnes and accounted for 55% of the global mined antimony supply.
Data from China’s Customs shows that the country imported 890 tonnes of antimony in 2023. However, total volumes were likely to be more than this because gold-antimony concentrates were imported under the “gold” category. Meanwhile China exported 5,240 tonnes of antimony in 2023.
Volatile feedstock supplies from sanctioned Russia
Russia is another major source of antimony, but uncertainty over supplies since its invasion of Ukraine in 2022 is another major factor behind the recent antimony price rally.
According to the USGS, Russia accounted for 17.5% of the world’s total reserves in 2023 at 350,000 tonnes. In term of production, the country produced 4,300 tonnes of antimony in 2023, making it the world’s fifth-largest producer after China, Tajikistan, Turkey, and Myanmar.
Russia’s position in the market is further complicated by its gold industry, which generates antimony as a by-product. The full-year report from a world leading antimony miner in Russia — Polyus — shows its output of antimony in flotation concentrate amounted to 27,075 tonnes.
Polyus is familiar to many as Russia’s major gold producer. Its key Olimpiada mine in the Krasnoyarsk region of Eastern Siberia is the miner’s only gold-antimony mine, and it produces antimony as a byproduct. Other mines owned by Polyus are not producing antimony, Fastmarkets understand.
The company has been subjected to Western sanctions imposed soon after Russia’s attempted all-out invasion of Ukraine began in February 2022. “[The sanctions] are full scale now, so not only banks won’t handle transactions [with Russian businesses], but companies trading with Russia are at high risk [of being sanctioned by the US government],” said a market source.
Unrest in Myanmar
Myanmar has been facing political unrest since the end of 2023. Transportation issues caused by the country’s unstable security situation have led to limited and unreliable supply of antimony coming out of Southeast Asia, a region where smelters rely primarily on raw materials from Myanmar.
Earlier this year, multiple media outlets reported that Burmese civilians and soldiers had fled to the northeast Indian state of Mizoram between November and January 2023. Intensifying clashes between Myanmar’s military and rebel groups had prompted significant displacement of people from across the country.
Cross-border trading has also been blocked by the fighting in Myanmar, preventing shipments of antimony raw materials from reaching smelters in Southeast Asia. As a consequence, since December 2023 these smelters have been offering reduced quantities of antimony metal for sale at higher prices, sources told Fastmarkets.
According to market sources, availability of antimony metal improved since late May / early June this year after a major smelter located in Myanmar returned to the market. However, the political situation in Myanmar remains volatile.
Data from the USGS shows that Myanmar was the largest producer of antimony last year after China, Tajikistan, and Turkey, accounting for about 5% of global antimony mine production in 2023.
All eyes on Tajikistan
A combination of supply constraints from China, Russia and Myanmar leaves all eyes on Tajikistan — the world’s second largest antimony producer.
According to USGS, Tajikistan produced 21,000 tonnes of antimony in 2023, accounting for 26% of global antimony mine production last year.
The established antimony mine in Tajikistan is owned by a US company and is considered by many market participants to be the largest seller of antimony metal in Europe.
There is also a newcomer in Tajikistan, Talco Gold – a joint venture between the Tursunzoda-based Tajik Aluminium Co (Talco) and China’s Tibet Huayu Mining. Talco Gold’s production capacity and mine plans remain unclear, however, and the company has not yet released its output data.
The company opened its gold processing plant in April 2022. The project was supposed to launch in 2019 but was delayed because of the Covid-19 pandemic.
Average prices for antimony metal in Rotterdam – assessed by Fastmarkets – have almost doubled in two months, from $13,400 per tonne on 12 April to $22,700 per tonne on 14 June 2024. Fastmarkets-assessed prices for antimony metal and antimony trioxide both passed their previous all-time highs in May. After that, brand new record highs were reached in every pricing session, by the time of writing on 17 June.
However, the growth rate in prices has slowed since the beginning of June, when Chinese environmental inspections ended and the flow of materials from Southeast Asia picked up. However raw material from Russia needs to reach the market to ease supply in the long term.
