Myanmar tin ‘flood’ leads to world market price plunge

21 April 2015
Myanmar tin ‘flood’ leads to world market price plunge

The price of tin has fallen for eight straight sessions on the London Metal Exchange and Myanmar is to blame, according to a report in The Wall Street Journal on April 19.
Prices for the metal, which is used mainly in the consumer-electronics industry, hit a five and a half year low on the London Metal Exchange this past week, and the fall is largely the result of a flood of supply from Myanmar.
The newspaper says Myanmar has been shut off from the outside world for most of the last 60 years as an austere military regime held a tight grip on the economy. The country began to open up in 2011, and the tin market has been one of the first to feel the impact.
Tin’s price drop is due to a “huge increase in supply into China from Myanmar,” said Mr James Sutton, a portfolio manager on the global natural-resources equities team at J.P. Morgan Asset Management, speaking to the WSJ.
The three-month tin contract traded on the London Metal Exchange plunged more than 9 percent to US$13,600 (K13.6 million) a metric ton for a time during early trading in Europe on April 17.