According to foreign news on February 19, London aluminum hit a one-month high on Wednesday, because Russian primary aluminum exports to the EU market or face difficulties.
At 19:38 Beijing time, aluminum for three-month delivery on the London Metal Exchange (LME) was up $24.5, or 0.92 percent, at $2,693 a tonne, after earlier hitting $2,702.5, its highest since Jan. 20.
According to EU diplomats, the 27 EU ambassadors to the EU have reached an agreement on the 16th round of EU sanctions against Russia, and the new sanctions introduce a ban on imports of Russian primary aluminum.
The 27 member states of the European Union have been reducing aluminum imports from Russia since 2022, so the region is less dependent on Russia, helping to limit the reaction of aluminum prices, traders said.
LME aluminum has risen for four consecutive sessions and also attracted buying from Commodity Trading Advisers (CTA), a trader said.
Further support was provided by LME inventory data, which showed total aluminum stocks in LME-registered warehouses fell to 547,950 tonnes, the lowest since May, after an outflow of 4,000 tonnes on Wednesday.
The long-term geopolitical impact on metals is unclear.
"Overall, the industry is trying to figure out what's going on on the demand side in the near term, given the threat of tariffs in the U.S. and what affected companies might do in response," said Ole Hansen, head of commodity strategy at Saxo Bank.
In other metals, copper for three-month delivery on the LME rose 0.4 percent to $9,513 a tonne. Three-month zinc rose 0.3% to $2,893.5 a tonne. Nickel for three-month delivery was steady at $15,350; Three-month tin rose 0.5 percent to $32,910 a tonne. Three-month lead slipped 0.8% to $1,981 a tonne.
