DETROIT (ResourceInvestor.com) -- Platts Metals Daily for November 2, 2006, reports that as of November 1, 2006, the Chinese have imposed an export duty on molybdenum oxide and ferromolybdenum of 10%. A two tier pricing system has thus been created by and for the benefit of Chinese industry.
Ferromolybdenum imports from China are one of, if not, the major sources of ferromolybdenum used by U.S. foundries and steel mills. An American foundry that makes exhaust manifolds for automotive use may use, for example, an alloy that contains 1% and up of molybdenum to add corrosion resistance at high temperature. Using 65% molybdenum containing ferromolybdenum to get 1% molybdenum in the final alloy means that I will need to add 31 pounds of ferromolybdenum for each tonne of casting metal.
Ferromolybdenum was selling on Halloween for about $30 per pound. A 10% increase in cost adds $186 per tonne to my costs. My Chinese competitor has no such cost increase. If I am making Hastalloy for use as inserts in forging dies my cost of metal as cast has just increased by as much as $1,500 per tonne! In this case my Chinese competitor, in China, no longer has any competition from me.
Anyone who thinks that the steel mills and the foundry industry in America are not now looking for molybdenum in scrap is wrong. This source has been generally ignored up until now by all but the specialty alloy manufacturers, but the sale of portable x-ray fluorescence analyzers that can identify metals and alloys in scrap as it lays are through the roof.
The American Metal Market conference on auto steel has a panel on recovering strategic alloys from scrap, and the conference is under way as I write. It is, interestingly enough, the most attended conference on this subject that the AMM has ever seen.
Click to read original article, “Molybdenum Pricing: Recycling Becomes a Key Factor.”
