China stainless steel mogul fights to avoid a second collapse
A debt crisis is threatening the future of one of the world’s top stainless steel producers, Jiangsu Delong Nickel Industry.
Jiangxi Copper Co , one of China’s biggest copper producers, on Tuesday said net profits jumped more than fivefold year-on-year in the first quarter to their highest since 2014 on the back of booming prices for the red metal.
The Nanchang-based company said its net income was 859.4 million yuan ($132.5 million) in the first three months of 2021, up 436.3% from 160.3 million yuan a year earlier and its best quarterly result since a 1.13 billion yuan profit in the third quarter of 2014, according to Refinitiv Eikon data.
Revenues came in at 102 billion yuan, Jiangxi Copper said in a filing to the Shanghai Stock Exchange, up 81.5% from the first quarter of 2020, when the coronavirus outbreak had sunk prices and sapped metal demand.
Benchmark London copper prices rose over the remaining three quarters of last year, propelled by recovering demand in top consumer China, and clocked a gain of around 13% in the first quarter of 2021.
Copper on Tuesday hit a 10-year high of $9,965 a tonne on expectations Chinese demand is moving into a seasonally strong period and concerns over supply from top producer Chile.
($1 = 6.4852 Chinese yuan renminbi)
(By Tom Daly; Editing by Louise Heavens)
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