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Beijing has increased purchases of Russian metals, according to Chinese customs data. Chinese imports of Russian aluminium jumped nearly 56% year-on-year to almost one million tons between January and May, while copper purchases surged 66% and nickel imports more than doubled, according to the Chinese statistics.
While Russia’s largest aluminium producers Rusal and Norilsk Nickel are not under Western sanctions, their access to global trading platforms has been restricted. In April 2024, the US and UK barred the London Metal Exchange (LME) and Chicago Mercantile Exchange (CME) from accepting Russian-origin aluminium, copper, and nickel and barred imports of the metals. The United States had earlier imposed 200% duties on Russian-made aluminium products, while Canada enacted a full ban on imports of Russian aluminium and steel. Earlier this year, the EU introduced a phased ban on Russian aluminium, setting a 275,000-ton quota that runs through February 2026.
Russian aluminium is also more globally competitive, selling at US$1,866 per tonne against the LME’s current spot price of US$2,598, suggesting that Western impositions are more to do with deliberate market manipulation than support for Ukraine.
These measures also triggered spikes in global metal prices, with aluminium seeing its biggest surge in values in decades. Moscow has instead redirected exports to Asia and the Middle East amid the shift away from Western markets.
Norilsk Nickel began boosting sales to China in the second half of 2024. The company is also reportedly working with a unit of Chinese gold giant Shandong Gold to expand copper cathode shipments to the country. Sanctioned producers such as Russian Copper and UMCC may also be shipping metal to China. Norilsk Nickel’s chief executive, Vladimir Potanin, has said the company plans to relocate some copper smelting operations to China to safeguard exports from sanctions pressure on financial transactions. Rusal has already acquired some Chinese producers.
Further Reading
Indian Imports Of Metallurgical Coal From Russia Grows To 21% Of Total
