1 November 2021: Drivers behind China’s excess import trend could move the global platinum market into deficit: China continues to import platinum at volumes that are almost twice its visible demand levels. The underlying demand drivers behind this momentum remain unexplained, but ‘excess’ China imports so far in 2021 appear to have been sufficient to consume all of the forecast surplus presented in the latest Platinum Quarterly, and to push the market into a deficit. In this report we examine possible reasons for this behaviour in China, which include opportunistic price sensitive stock-building, higher per-vehicle platinum loadings, and platinum substitution for palladium. Whilst these theories are compelling, we cannot present data to prove them. However, we can demonstrate that should China imports continue at current rates, the forecast 2022 surplus of +637 koz would potentially become a deficit as large as -255 koz.
Platinum Perspectives
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