China's production of refined copper, nickel, primary aluminium and its precursor raw material alumina hit monthly records in June, making a strong finish to the first half of 2011, official data showed on Wednesday. Refined copper production rose 8.7 percent on the month to 477,000 tonnes in June after posting a 3.3 percent monthly fall to 439,000 tonnes in May, the data from the National Bureau of Statistics showed.
The June 2011 output was a 12 percent rise from June 2010 and 1.5 percent higher than the previous record of 470,000 tonnes in March 2011. In the first half of 2011, refined copper production rose 13.9 percent on the year to 2.644 million tonnes.
"The June refined copper output was a surprise. Some producers should have increased operational rates to meet their first-half production targets," said Fu Bin, an analyst at Jinrui Futures, a subsidiary of top producer Jiangxi Copper. He added that state-owned smelters typically set annual and semi-annual production targets, while privately owned smelters produced to order.
A 100,000-tonne per year copper production plant that used copper scrap as feedstock planned to start production in June and that may have added to the total output, Fu said. Primary aluminium production in China, the world's top producer of the metal, rose 3.6 percent on the month to a fourth consecutive record at 1.591 million tonnes in June, up 13.3 percent from a year ago due to new capacity.
In the first half of 2011, aluminium output rose 5.6 percent on the year to 8.643 million tonnes. Industry sources said many smelters had started production with new capacity during the period from March to May 2011 and were expected to gradually increase production through August. Record aluminium production also boosted demand for alumina, the main material for production of the metal. In June, alumina production inched up 0.8 percent on the month to a third consecutive record at 3.143 million tonnes, up 29.3 percent from June 2010.
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