
Tin concentrate TC to go down further
----Interview with Huanqun Zhang
General Manager
Gejiu Qiandao Metal Co., Ltd.
General Manager
Gejiu Qiandao Metal Co., Ltd.
Gejiu Qiandao Metal Co., Ltd., established in June 2017 and located in Gejiu City, Honghe Prefecture, Yunnan Province, China, is a large company which integrates non-ferrous metal trade and processing. The company mainly purchases tin raw materials and has in-depth cooperation with domestic and foreign mineral processing enterprises. The supply of goods mainly comes from domestic and many overseas countries. After several years of efforts, the company has become a leader in the industry and occupies an important position in the tin industry.
Asian Metal:Welcome to the interview hosted by Asian Metal Mr. Zhang. Please introduce your company first.
Mr. Zhang:The Company was established on June 29, 2017 with a registered capital of about RMB6,000,000(USD861,000). The business scope covers fields of non-ferrous and ferrous metals, and the main business is trading tin concentrate and tin ingots. Our regular monthly trading volume of tin concentrate is about 2,000 metal tons. Our customers are mainly upstream mines, 95% of which are in Myanmar, and downstream smelters in China.


Asian Metal:Domestic tin prices fell sharply from May to August this year, what’s the main reason for this and how did your company respond?
Mr. Zhang:In fact, the inflation rates in various countries stood high before May, resulting in constantly high prices of tin ingots. With the rise of inflation, various countries, especially Western countries dominated by the United States, took tough interest rate hikes to curb inflation, leading to a rapid decline in tin prices; In addition to that the overall shrinking market demand this year, resulting in the price crash. From August to mid-November, although prices were still in the downward range, the overall rate of price decline slowed. After the tin price fell sharply, we used the method of "locking price" to settle with the smelter to avoid great loss.
Asian Metal:How did the TCs change during the price fall?
Mr. Zhang:The TCs has been going down from RMB27,000/metal ton(USD3,874/metal ton) in early May to RMB17,000/metal ton (USD2,439/metal ton) currently (based on 40%min). The TCs are affected by the price of tin ingots and supply-demand relationship. The average tin recovery rate stands at 97.5%, that is to say 2.5% of the metal tin would be lost in the refining process. So the higher the tin prices are, the higher the loss will be, and vice versa. So if the tin price goes down, the TCs will go down, and vice versa. Then supply-demand relationship is also one of the influencing factors. If the current supply of tin ore exceeds the market demand, the tin price falls, the TCs will inevitably decrease, and the tin price rises, the TCs will also appropriately rise. The prices of tin ingots continued to fall in November and production needs to be continuous, smelters cannot easily suspend production, refineries are competing for raw materials, so the supply keeps tight, the TCs probably would have further downward space.

