South African riot will influence the global TiO2 market

Rio Tinto announced on December 4 that Rio Tinto Group announced that it had suspended its mining operations and expansion projects at Richards Bay Minerals in South Africa due to escalating violence in surrounding communities. Suspended. This event will directly affect the global titanium raw material market, especially the future trend of the high slag raw material market of chlorinated titanium dioxide. At the same time, the production of titanium slag by the Norwegian titanium slag production plant is not very smooth, so the future titanium slag market is very severe and tight. The price of raw materials for chlorinated titanium dioxide will remain high in the future, and the production cost of chlorinated titanium dioxide will continue to increase. After China’s titanium dioxide market entered the traditional off-season, two divergences occurred. Some manufacturers carried out price increases due to the cost of raw materials, while other manufacturers threw out goods in order to clean up some inventory. However, under the pressure of high-priced raw materials, most of China’s titanium dioxide manufacturers are not willing to conduct price reductions but instead enter the state of parking and maintenance. At the same time, most titanium dioxide manufacturers’ products are relatively tight, and titanium dioxide products are out of stock in the market. The situation is still very grim, so in the traditional off-season, some manufacturers announced price increases, of which two chlorinated titanium dioxide manufacturers announced a price increase of 80-100usd, and another sulfated titanium dioxide manufacturer announced a price increase of 50usd.

Future market judgment:

Due to the suspension of the operation of Richards Bay Mining Company of South Africa, and according to Kenmare, the supply of high-grade titanium ore in 2020 will be very tight, and there will be no excess supply to high-slag producers and the chlorination method. Titanium dioxide factory, it is expected that the future price of chlorinated titanium dioxide market will mainly increase prices to offset the pressure brought by the cost of raw materials. It is expected that the chlorinated method will increase by about 80-120 US dollars in the near future. The future trend of high-grade titanium ore resources and high-titanium slag will continue to be tight, and it will continue to bring continuous raw material cost pressures to producers of chlorinated titanium dioxide.

Roland Wong, Market Researcher
TINOX CHEMIE GMBH
Dusseldorf, Germany