The price of antimony ingot in Europe has stabilized at US,600-14,200/ton recently, up 45% from August last year

The harm of antimony smelting to the environment and human body forces the government to strictly control its output. In March last year, the government and environmental protection departments of Lengshuijiang in Hunan jointly launched a storm to rectify the antimony industry. Hundreds of illegal antimony smelters and small and medium-sized workshops were shut down. The forced ban has led to a sharp reduction in the antimony market supply. In addition, the Chinese New Year holiday also affected the supply of antimony in the European market to a certain extent, and the price was also pulled up in the short term.

It is reported that due to the serious pollution of land, air and water, and the high incidence of lung and heart problems among residents in recent years, the Lengshuijiang area has been successfully selected into the list of national resource-exhausted cities. However, Lengshuijiang is not alone. There are 44 cities that are clearly defined as resource-exhausted. On the other hand, this move has further motivated the industry to find alternatives to antimony, which should be good news for the residents of Lengshuijiang.

In January this year, Reuters reported that one of the reasons for the increasingly tight supply of antimony is the increasing demand from European antimony consumers. Although this cannot be reflected in European GDP data last year, it has been Recognized by most market participants, coupled with China's environmental protection rectification factors, it is natural that antimony prices continue to refresh historical records.

In addition, the government has also extended strict control measures on the rare earth industry to antimony and other similar metal industries. China's Ministry of Land and Resources recently announced the closure of 280 illegal mines, and there are reports that the total distribution of rare earth, tungsten, antimony and tin in provinces and cities in 2010 has been reduced from 400 to 116.

With the expansion of antimony application fields, the price increase has obviously become a stumbling block for downstream consumers and related buyers, but the price of antimony cannot continue to soar. The key to tracking and forecasting the trend of antimony prices at present is to pay attention to the latest environmental protection measures of China's environmental protection authorities and how to restrict the development direction of antimony smelters.