Secondary Lead Price Gap Shrinks between Japan and Overseas

Japanese battery makers and secondary lead smelters have recently adopted a new price system for secondary lead ingot along which the secondary lead price is reviewed every month while the price had been revised every 6 or 12 months. Secondary lead price became able to reflect a fluctuation of overseas primary lead market more closely. Consequently secondary lead price gap got smaller between Japanese and offshore markets. Japanese battery makers aim to secure secondary lead from outflow to overseas by the price improvement.Japanese secondary lead smelters are selling recycled lead ingot with additive alloys at around 300,000 yen per tonne to domestic battery makers. The price almost doubled compared with the beginning of this year. Japanese export price of lead bullion is around 320,000-340,000 yen per tonne for China and South Korea. The export price exceeded the domestic market price by more than 50,000 yen for a while. The price gap is currently decreasing to 20,000-40,000 yen.Price negotiations between Japanese battery makers and secondary lead smelters had been set once in 6-12 months or irregularly. On the other hand, lead bullion export price follows the fluctuation of overseas lead market. Primary lead settlement at London Metal Exchange approached US$ 4,000 per tonne in October which jumped up from US$ 1,725 at the beginning of this year. As a result, Japanese bullion export price became much higher than the domestic selling price. The outflow of secondary lead ingot and used batteries strongly increased and domestic battery makers became suffered from material shortage.