US Ferrous scrap exports declined in Jan-Feb ‘16

SPOKANE (Scrap Monster): The exports of ferrous scrap and aluminum declined during the first month of the current year. On the other hand, exports of recovered plastics surged higher by over 16% during February 2016.

The latest scrap export data released for the month of Feb ‘16 indicates that scrap plastics export volumes increased sharply by 16.3% when compared with the previous month. The exports totaled 309.12 million pounds during the month. Also, the exports were up marginally by 1.5% when compared with the 304.6 million pounds exported during Feb ’15. The cumulative scrap plastics exports during the first two months of the current year has recorded marginal decline of 1.1% over the previous year. The average price through Feb ’16 at 16.97 cents per pound was down sharply by over 10% when compared with the previous year.

The weighted price of scrap plastic exports in Jan ‘16 stood at 16.94 cents per pound, slightly down by 0.4% over the previous month. The weighted price was down by 7.5% when compared with Feb ‘15. The weighted price had averaged at 18.314 during February last year.

Recovered paper exports improved by 12.4% to 3.25 million metric tons during the initial two-month period of the current year. Also, the weighted average price during the year until February has declined by 7.5% to $148 per metric ton.

Ferrous scrap exports declined sharply by 21.8% during January to February this year to 1.59 million metric tons. The weighted average price during the two-month month was down significantly by 26.8% year-on-year at $256 per metric ton.

Also, aluminum scrap exports during the first two months of the current year dropped significantly by 4.0% to 450.83 million pounds. The weighted average price too dropped 18.6% year-on-year to 61 cents per pound when compared with February 2015 levels.