China's domestic copper cathode output is expected to rise 5.6% year on year to 6.6 million mt in 2014, an analyst from state-owned nonferrous metals information division Beijing Antaike said Wednesday.
In 2013, China's output stood around 6.25 million mt, up about 10% from 2012, according to Antaike's own record.
The official attributed the increase to higher capacity, which is expected to rise to around 10 million mt in 2014, up about 11.1% from 2013.
In addition, he had said the increase in copper cathode output was in tandem with higher Chinese copper consumption in 2014, which was expected to grow by 6.5% year on year to 8.7 million mt.
In 2013, capacity was around 9 million mt compared with 8-8.2 million mt in 2012 due to capacity expansion by some plants.
Among the projects coming online, the Antaike analyst said the more prominent one was Jinchuan's Fangchenggang copper smelter in the Guangxi province, which has a capacity of 400,000 mt/year.
Construction was completed last year and commissioning took place in October.
"Definitely, the Fangchenggang plant will start commercial production this year," the analyst said.
He said two other projects to keep an eye on were Shangdong's Fangyuan Nonferrous Metals Group and Guangxi Nanguo Nonferrous Metals Group.
Fangyuan's copper capacity is expected to reach 600,000 mt/year by the end of the 12th five-year plan period (2011-2015), up from the current 400,000 mt/year.
Nanguo's new plant, which started construction in 2013, is scheduled for completion in 2015. It will have a capacity of 150,000 mt/year.
Meanwhile, due to the higher Chinese copper cathode capacity and increased global supply of concentrates, the analyst said China's copper concentrate imports were expected to rise by more than 10% in 2014.
China imported 10.1 million mt of copper concentrates in 2013, up 28.7% year on year.
In 2013 the top sources of imports were Chile (2.8 million mt), Peru (1.9 million mt), Australia (893,195 mt), Mongolia (566,292 mt), Mexico (562,441 mt), the US (557,962 mt), Canada (478,573 mt), Turkey (346,957 mt), Mauritania (225,712 mt) and the Philippines (224,291 mt), according to the data from the General Administration of Customs of China.
Due to the tight supply of scrap, the analyst said Chinese copper smelters would focus their attention on furnaces that use copper concentrates.
China imported 4.37 million mt of copper scrap in 2013, down 10% year on year.
