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☆ JPMorgan scales down metals business - Bloomberg News
▼ + stars: | 2023-04-13 | by ( ) www.reuters.com time to read: +1 min

[1/2] A view of the exterior of the JP Morgan Chase & Co. corporate headquarters in New York City May 20, 2015. REUTERS/Mike SegarApril 13 (Reuters) - JPMorgan Chase & Co (JPM.N) has stopped working with dozens of base metals clients and slashed bonuses of its bankers after last year's nickel crisis, Bloomberg News reported on Thursday, citing people familiar with the matter. JPMorgan's metals business has been under strict internal scrutiny due to the bank's role in the upheaval last year, when the London Metal Exchange (LME) was forced to suspend nickel trading after the metal's prices doubled. JPMorgan has cut numerous base metals clients in Asia, particularly stopping business with privately owned Chinese companies, according to the Bloomberg report. The bank is continuing to work only with a few large, long-standing clients in the region, the report added.

☆ Factbox: LME's measures to revive its nickel contract
▼ + stars: | 2023-03-30 | by ( ) www.reuters.com time to read: +2 min

LONDON, March 30 (Reuters) - The London Metal Exchange (LME) on Thursday launched sweeping measures to revive its flagging nickel contract, including plans to cut waiting times and scrap fees for new brands of the metal that can be delivered against its contract. Below is the list of the initiative:- The LME plans to cut the waiting period to approve new nickel brands to three months of regular sample assaying while also waiving fees. - The LME will consider broadening its nickel contract to include coarse nickel powder, which can be converted and used in production of batteries, to increase the amount of nickel eligible for delivery. - The LME will work with the Qianhai Mercantile Exchange (QME) to develop a China-based spot market for nickel sulphate and nickel matte to support trade flows in Asia. - The LME plans to consider whether temporary measures, designed to address the current low levels of stocks - a backwardation limit and deferred delivery mechanism - should be made a permanent element of its rulebook.

Soldering demand from the electronics sector remains weak and investors in London and Shanghai continue to play the market from the short side. Surging purchases of electronic goods during lockdown were followed by sharply reduced spending as many Western consumers were hit by a cost-of-living squeeze. LME positioning reports show both investment funds and other financial players are currently net short of the London tin contract after the early-year rally went into reverse. LME tin price, stocks and cash-3s spreadSHANGHAI STOCKS UP, LONDON STOCKS DOWNReasons to be negative are more obvious in China. ShFE registered tin stocks have risen by 60% to 8,745 tonnes since the start of January.

☆ Warehouse workers around the world are being told to kick bags of nickel to make sure they're not filled with stones like JPMorgan recently discovered
▼ + stars: | 2023-03-28 | by ( Lakshmi Varanasi | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +2 min

More than a million dollars of supposed nickel that belonged to JPMorgan was actually discovered as bags of stones. Since then, warehouse workers have been frantically checking bags of nickel by kicking the bags, Bloomberg reported. The mass inspection across the world's warehouses has also involved carefully weighing and scanning the bags, Bloomberg reported. While no other discrepancies have yet been discovered, Bloomberg said, the mystery of what happened to JPMorgan's bags remains unsolved. That's because there is a record of the material being weighed when it was first entered into the warehouse, Bloomberg said.

LONDON, March 27 (Reuters) - Funds have dumped their bets on higher copper prices as the turbulence triggered by the collapse of Silicon Valley Bank continues to roil financial markets. The investment community has turned net short of CME copper for the first time in five months, while funds have cut their long exposure on the London Metal Exchange (LME). Investors' negativity towards Doctor Copper contrasts with the bullish headlines generated by the FT Commodities Global Summit. Investment funds bought into copper in January, the net long position expanding from 11,830 to 32,397 contracts at the end of the month. Bulls such as Trafigura and Goldman Sachs contend it's a very thin inventory cushion if China rediscovers its copper mojo.

☆ How Amazon’s flawed job posting process caused it to overhire
▼ + stars: | 2023-03-22 | by ( Diamond Naga Siu | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +5 min

Before I go check my remaining stash to make sure it's all real, let's dive into today's tech. Amazon's flawed job posting process. The company had little oversight of the hiring process until last year, Insider learned. Check out this leaked, all-hands message about "single-digit" percentage cuts to AWS)My colleague Eugene Kim breaks down Amazon's flawed hiring process. He shared the red flags he overlooked during the hiring process, including the hiring of a new chief revenue officer.

LONDON, March 21 (Reuters) - The London Metal Exchange (LME) has discovered that some of its registered nickel is missing. Bags of stones shouldn't pass any inspection, whether at original load-in or during the annual audit of registered stock required by the LME's warehousing agreement. But it folds into the bigger issues around the exchange's governance and regulatory capacity after the blow-out of the nickel contract this time last year. BROKEN NICKELThe latest scandal will also intensify the question of whether the LME nickel contract is fulfilling the function of efficient price discovery forum. The nickel market was already looking for different pricing solutions before the March 8, 2022 suspension of LME nickel trading.

☆ The world's top metals trader is stuck in another nickel-shipment snafu after getting bags of stones from a Dutch warehouse
▼ + stars: | 2023-03-21 | by ( Filip De Mott | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +2 min

Trafigura discovered that it received bag of stones from a warehouse in Rotterdam instead of nickel. Last month, Trafigura disclosed an unrelated fraud on nickel shipments and faces a $577 million loss. Earlier, the Wall Street Journal reported that JPMorgan Chase was the owner of bags of stones at the warehouse. Stratton Metals, a metal trader in Europe, also reportedly got bags of stones instead of nickel. Meanwhile, Trafigura has said there's no connection between the bags of stones and a separate snafu related to nickel cargoes.

☆ JPMorgan Chase thought it had $1.3 million of nickel, but they were all bags of stones. It's happened before.
▼ + stars: | 2023-03-21 | by ( Huileng Tan | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +3 min

JPMorgan Chase kept bags of stones in a warehouse thinking they were nickel. In November 2022, commodities trading giant Trafigura discovered carbon steel and other types of steel and iron instead of the nickel it had ordered. Carbon steel tends to be priced at about 5% of the value of the costlier metal, according to the Financial Times. Nickel prices surged to around $50,000 a metric ton on March 7, 2022 and then to $100,000 a ton a day later, but have come off to around $22,800 a ton ton now. In the complaint, a merchant called Nanni criticized his supplier for sending him low-quality copper ingots and demanded his money back.

☆ JPMorgan Chase thought it had $1.3 million worth of nickel stored in a warehouse. A closer examination revealed bags of stones.
▼ + stars: | 2023-03-20 | by ( Lakshmi Varanasi | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +3 min

JPMorgan Chase kept bags of stones in a Dutch warehouse thinking they were nickel, according to the WSJ. The owner of the bags is reportedly JPMorgan Chase, according to the Journal. Had they contained nickel, the bags would have been worth $1.3 million at current prices, representing 0.14% of nickel inventories, Bloomberg reported. JPMorgan Chase reportedly bought the bags years ago and remains an active player in big metals, the Journal said. JPMorgan Chase and the LME also did not immediately respond to Insider's request for a comment.

☆ LME finds 'irregularities' in several nickel bags at a warehouse
▼ + stars: | 2023-03-17 | by ( ) www.reuters.com time to read: +2 min

March 17 (Reuters) - The London Metal Exchange (LME) on Friday postponed the resumption of nickel trading during Asian hours by a week to March 27 after it found nickel that failed to meet contract specifications at an LME warehouse. The LME said it had cancelled nine nickel warrants - an ownership document for metals placed in an LME-approved warehouse - at one warehouse facility, without naming it. The LME said the non-conformant warrants represent 0.14% of live nickel stock in its warehouses. The 146-year-old LME said the issues with nickel related to bagged nickel briquettes, which were found to not have the correct weight. The exchange said it had no reason to believe that any other LME facility was affected, but still called on all warehouse operators to undertake inspections of warranted nickel.

☆ Rio Tinto sees robust short term outlook for copper
▼ + stars: | 2023-03-14 | by ( ) www.reuters.com time to read: +2 min

[1/4] A worker stands at a processing facility at Oyu Tolgoi copper mine in the Gobi Desert, Mongolia March 13, 2023. RentsendorjKHANBOGD, Mongolia, March 14 (Reuters) - The short-term outlook for copper is "pretty healthy," with global stockpiles trending down and mine disruptions having eroded supply from Latin America, Rio Tinto's head of copper Bold Baatar said on Tuesday. "Physical stocks of inventories of copper are at multi-year lows," he said, adding that copper demand in China was "relatively strong." "So at the moment, even in the short-term outlook, there's a pretty healthy demand picture," Baatar said. Reporting by B. Rentsendorj at Oyu Tolgoi and Mai Nguyen in Hanoi; Editing by Sharon SingletonOur Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.

LME SPECIAL COMMITTEEA day earlier, on March 7, when LME benchmark nickel prices had soared 66% to nearly $50,000 a tonne, the LME's Special Committee had met, Jane Street's document said. The Committee, which has emergency powers, "concluded that the nickel market remained orderly, since there were geopolitical and macroeconomic reasons for the price increases". The next day, however, when nickel prices skyrocketed, the committee did not meet, the document said. Jane Street executed nickel trades from 1:37 a.m. on March 8 and was due total proceeds on those trades of $32.7 million, it said in the document. The LME is also facing fresh lawsuits from ten hedge funds and asset managers for cancelling nickel trades.

☆ Dollar rises ahead of Powell speech; China data knocks commodities
▼ + stars: | 2023-03-07 | by ( Amanda Cooper | ) www.reuters.com time to read: +5 min

Beyond China, investor focus remains on the U.S. interest rate outlook and what Powell may say. If a similar message is conveyed by Chair Powell, we could see U.S. Treasury yields rising again and the dollar reversing back to an uptrend," they said. The MSCI All-World index of global shares (.MIWD00000PUS) edged down by 0.1%, but held near Monday's two-week highs. That pushed the Australian dollar to a more than two-month low of $0.6664, marking a loss of 1% on the day. The dollar pared earlier losses against the yen to trade up 0.2% at 136.19, near last week's 2023 high at 137.10.

☆ Emirates Global Aluminium's 2022 profit surges to a record $2 bln
▼ + stars: | 2023-03-07 | by ( ) www.reuters.com time to read: +1 min

DUBAI, March 7 (Reuters) - Emirates Global Aluminium (EGA), one of the world's largest aluminium producers, said on Tuesday its annual net profit for 2022 surged 34% to a record of 7.4 billion dirhams ($2.01 billion) on higher prices. The United Arab Emirates firm said average realised London Metal Exchange price for its metal was $2,715 per tonne. Benchmark aluminium on the London Metal Exchange (LME) reached a decade-high in March last year to $3,985 per tonne, before retreating to a low of $2,080 in September. "The immediate outlook for aluminium remains under some pressure due to its close correlation to the health of the global economy," Abdulnasser Bin Kalban, EGA's chief executive, was quoted as saying in a statement. ($1 = 3.6727 UAE dirham)Reporting by Hadeel Al Sayegh; Editing by Muralikumar AnantharamanOur Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.

[1/2] Traders work on the floor of the London Metal Exchange, in London, Britain September 27, 2018. The world's largest and oldest metals market annulled all nickel trades in March last year after chaotic price action and suspended trading for the first time since 1988. "It does look from the statement that the FCA is not going to look at the cancelled trades," said a regulation lawyer. The LME faces lawsuits from U.S. hedge fund Elliott Associates and Jane Street Global Trading, which are suing the exchange for $456 million and $15.3 million, respectively, for the cancelled nickel trades. "Neither the Bank of England or the FCA have been clear about whether the LME should have cancelled the trades," said Harold de Boer, managing director at investment firm Transtrend.

☆ UK regulator starts enforcement investigation into LME nickel trading halt
▼ + stars: | 2023-03-03 | by ( ) www.cnbc.com time to read: 1 min

Britain's Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) has begun an enforcement investigation into the London Metal Exchange's (LME) suspension of nickel trading in 2022, the watchdog said on Friday. The FCA's investigation will review the conduct, systems and controls that the LME had in place between Jan. 1 and March 8 last year. The LME suspended chaotic nickel trading on March 8, 2022, after prices doubled to a record above $100,000 a tonne in a few hours. Both the FCA and the Bank of England began a review into the trading halt last April.

The world's largest and oldest metals market annulled all nickel trades in March last year after chaotic price action and suspended trading for the first time since 1988. "That the FCA has decided to investigate means it considers there are circumstances suggesting that LME may have committed serious misconduct. ACTIVE STEPSThe 146-year-old LME said it had taken active steps to enhance nickel market liquidity and transparency, including 15% daily price limits and over the counter (OTC) position reporting for all physically delivered metals. The FCA and Bank of England began a review last April into the trading halt by the LME, owned by Hong Kong Exchanges and Clearing (0388.HK). In January management consultants Oliver Wyman released an independent review of the nickel trading debacle and the exchange said it would set out an implementation plan for the report's recommendations by the end of March.

Aluminium will be hardest hit with penal tariffs of 200% on imports of Russian metal, effective March 10, and imports of any third-country product containing Russian metal, effective April 10. This sort of "super contango" is the market's cry for financiers to pick up spare metal, particularly Russian metal. The Gwangyang deliveries are reported to be Russian aluminium being delivered by Glencore (GLEN.L), which has a long-term off-take deal with Rusal. The cash-to-threes time-spread will be a litmus test of financing appetite for Russian aluminium over the coming period. The only get-out for supplier nations is if they too impose minimum 200% tariffs on their own Russian aluminium imports.

LONDON, Feb 24 (Reuters) - The global nickel market flipped from deficit to surplus over the course of 2022, according to the International Nickel Study Group (INSG). Indonesia's mined nickel production expanded by 48% to 1.58 million tonnes in 2022, according to the INSG. However, as Indonesian production of Class II nickel rises, the Class I market shrinks. Around 70% of the physical nickel supply chain is now priced at a discount to the LME benchmark. LME nickel volumes slumped by 28% last year and January's activity was 60% lower than that of January 2022.

☆ Exclusive: CME to launch nickel contract using prices from new platform -sources
▼ + stars: | 2023-02-22 | by ( Pratima Desai | ) www.reuters.com time to read: +3 min

CME want a nickel contract, they are planning to base it on traded prices on GCH's physical platform," one of the sources with direct knowledge of the matter said. In response to a request for comment, CME said: "We cannot comment on whether we are developing any particular product." Nickel industry sources said illiquidity meant LME nickel prices often did not represent the fundamentals of the market. "There aren't really any alternatives to the LME contract at the moment and the market needs a liquid contract. Using ShFE's nickel contract is difficult for non-Chinese firms as they need to be affiliated with a local entity and because it is priced in yuan.

Power-hungry aluminium producers in Yunnan and neighbouring provinces were already operating at reduced capacity, some of them since September, dragging down China's national output. The latest cuts will impact around 740,000 tonnes of annual production capacity, adding to the million tonnes already offline, according to industry consultancy Mysteel. Aluminium capacity has grown to around 5.25 million tonnes, making it the fourth largest provincial producer after Shandong, Inner Mongolia and Xinjiang. January's estimated annualised production was 40.50 million tonnes, a drop of almost one million tonnes over the last five months. Registered inventory on both exchanges has risen fast, cushioning the supply chain from the loss of Chinese production momentum.

☆ G20 watchdog says commodity market concentration poses threat to wider economy
▼ + stars: | 2023-02-20 | by ( Huw Jones | ) www.reuters.com time to read: +2 min

The FSB, which coordinates financial rules for G20 economies, said that forced governments to offer liquidity to some cash-strapped market participants. But fallout from the surge in nickel prices echoed concerns over large, concentrated positions and opacity in commodities more generally. The commodities market adapted to stress by switching to opaque over-the-counter (OTC) or off-exchange contracts where margin requirements are less strict, making ties between commodities and banks more complex, the report said. FSB Commodities Graphic 1The FSB said vulnerabilities in commodities are similar to those in non-bank financial intermediaries as economies went into COVID-19 lockdowns, and are now being addressed. FSB Commodities Graphic 2Reporting by Huw Jones; Editing by Kirsten DonovanOur Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.

☆ Column: The devil's metal strikes again in Trafigura nickel fraud case
▼ + stars: | 2023-02-17 | by ( Andy Home | Thomson Reuters | Senior Metals Columnist Who Previously Covered Industrial Metals Markets For Metals Week | ) www.reuters.com time to read: +7 min

Appearances can be deceptive when it comes to nickel, as Trafigura has just found out half a millennium later. Just as it's impossible to say whether some of the recent price volatility on the LME nickel contract was down to Trafigura restructuring hedge positions. The problem is that LME nickel trading has been volatile and unpredictable ever since last year's meltdown. There is now also a growing crisis of confidence in the world of physical nickel trading. Nickel could really do with a reputational break but recent history suggests it's just a matter of time before the devil's metal strikes again.

With Europe's winter energy crisis abating and power prices falling, there are growing expectations that idled zinc smelter capacity will restart. The exchange's latest positioning report shows four dominant long positions on cash zinc as of Monday. All of which serves to underline just how depleted LME zinc stocks are. STOCKED OUTLME zinc stocks total just 25,075 tonnes, less than one day's worth of global consumption. LME zinc pricing is going to remain volatile for a while yet as shorts betting on a return to surplus have to navigate today's low-stock reality.

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