Minor metals slip on weak demand

Dec 03, 2009 | 10:48 AM | Anne Riley

Minor metal prices have continued to soften this month, a trend that players in the industry attribute to both seasonal weakness and stagnant demand.

"It's getting to be a little quiet," one domestic purchaser told AMM. "This historically is a slow time of the year, but this December seems to be especially quiet."

A trader agreed. "There's nothing going on out there," he said.

Market participants said much of the slowdown in buying can be traced to a lingering uncertainty about what the mid-term future may bring.

"(In the past), if we got to certain stock levels we'd go ahead and buy. Sometimes we'd go ahead and speculate. But after the order book fell apart this past year, it gets a little tougher to go out there and buy something and then find out your consumption patterns have totally dissipated," the purchaser said.....





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