China’s monthly refined tin imports in February reached the lowest point in the last 10 years. Imports in February were only 210t, down by 82% year-on-year. Affected by the Spring Festival, the whole tin industry was inactive for nearly half of the month. It is quite normal that the month of Spring Festival is the lowest import month of the year. Meanwhile, the stable but not strong enough market demand also resulted in the low import volume.

February tin concentrate imports amounted to 2,902t (gross weight), down by 9% on February 2013 and sharply lower than the 18,966t arriving in January. Concentrate imports from Myanmar amounted to 2,548t last month. Considering the large quantity pf low grade concentrate imports from Myanmar in the last two years, it could take a while for the processing of all the imported material.

China exported 25t refined tin in February, down 68% YOY. Yunnan Tin smelter’s maintenance shutdown and the Jiangxi province’s production halt led to a temporary tighter supply, which partially affected the export volume.