Nickel at a Ten-Month Low — What It Means for Special Alloy Buyers
LME nickel closed at 15,220 USD/t on 30 October, the weakest level in over ten months. Here is what the numbers actually say, and what a buyer of forged nickel alloy should do with them.
The headline numbers
LME nickel 3M closed at 15,220 USD/t on 30 October, down 295 USD/t on the day and around 1.9%. On the Shanghai side the main contract settled at 116,830 CNY/t. Against that, the domestic spot price for 1# nickel was quoted at 119,100 CNY/t on 2 November — a premium of roughly 2,300 CNY/t over the futures. That divergence is the single most useful fact on the screen right now.
Why the premium matters more than the price
When the physical market holds a widening premium over the paper market, spot sellers are refusing to chase the futures lower. On 2 November copper fell 520 CNY/t, aluminium fell 260 CNY/t and zinc fell 250 CNY/t — the whole complex was weak. Nickel spot fell 950 CNY/t but the premium over the nearby contract widened from 1,740 to about 2,300 CNY/t. A falling price with a widening premium describes sellers holding firm rather than a market in disorder.
Inventory: the fact that argues both ways
LME stocks stood at 278,238 tonnes with SHFE warrants at 88,554 tonnes. LME destocking has slowed to 24 tonnes in a session and SHFE's reduction streak has run eleven consecutive weeks. Combined visible inventory remains high in historical terms. High inventory caps upside; a decelerating destocking rate removes the argument that the floor is being built by drawdowns.
The supply side is a policy variable, not a geological one
Indonesia's Ministry of Energy and Mineral Resources has revised the 2026 RKAB nickel ore quota upward, to roughly 290 million tonnes from an initial allocation of 250 to 260 million tonnes. The November first-half HMA came at 15,478.67 USD/t for nickel, 369 USD/t below the second half of October. When the quota rises and the benchmark falls at the same time, the cost curve is being pushed down deliberately.
What this means if you buy forged nickel alloy
For a buyer of nickel-base forgings the direction of the metal matters less than the alloy surcharge structure and the lead time behind it. Three practical points follow.
- Quote on a formula, not a headline. The alloy surcharge in nickel-base grades moves with LME nickel; the conversion cost does not. Ask your supplier to show the two components separately so you can see which one you are actually exposed to.
- Alloy grades with high molybdenum or tungsten content — Hastelloy C-276, C-22, 625, 720, X750 — are not priced simply as a nickel multiple. Molybdenum and tungsten have their own markets and can move against nickel.
- Low and falling nickel is a good moment to convert stock. If your drawing allows bar, plate or tube instead of a one-off forging, the material cost is a smaller share of the total than it was a year ago.
A note on how we use these numbers
We publish market data because a buyer should never have to guess what the metal is doing when they ask for a quote. But a published benchmark is not a quotation. Your price depends on the grade, the form, the dimensions, the condition and the quantity — so ask, and we will price it against the day it is quoted.