Global metals market overview for April 13–18: futures prices still do not fully reflect the tightness in the physical market
🔎 The biggest takeaway from last week was not just higher prices, but the increasingly clear divergence between futures and the physical market. LME copper stayed around the elevated $13,000/t area even as LME inventories climbed to nearly 399,000 tons, while SHFE inventories kept falling sharply, suggesting that metal flows and domestic demand in China are moving in a very different direction.
📌 On the physical side, aluminium remained the main hotspot as premiums in Europe, Asia, and especially North America were pushed into record territory. The market is showing that real-world costs are rising much faster than exchange prices, especially as freight, war-risk insurance, and carbon-related costs all add pressure across the supply chain.
⚠️ US tariffs are now a major catalyst behind that trend. The Section 232 measures applied to the full customs value of aluminium, steel, copper, and related derivatives have widened North American premiums sharply, while Europe is still facing additional pressure from CBAM. That suggests the current move is no longer just a speculative price story, but increasingly a real-cost story for global metals trade.
🔋 In battery metals, the longer-term structure still looks constructive even though short-term volatility remains high. Lithium in China has already gone through a strong rally and pullback, but demand from energy storage systems continues to offer support, while cobalt remains affected by export delays in the DRC and changes in global trade flows.
💡 Another signal worth watching is the strong rise in LME liquidity, with both trading volumes and options activity jumping to unusually high levels in Q1. That suggests the metals market is not short on capital, but it also means prices may stay highly sensitive to LME-SHFE arbitrage, physical premiums, and further trade-policy changes in the weeks ahead.