CMJ Daily Tape
EXPORT CONTROL | COPPER
Shanghai Metals Market (SMM) said the EU, the US and several resource-producing countries are adding export restrictions, domestic sales requirements, export taxes and reporting rules to keep copper scrap for local smelters and manufacturers. The EU's revised Waste Shipment Regulation raises the approval threshold for non-hazardous waste exports to non-OECD countries, with effects on trade from 2027. The US is pursuing domestic sales requirements for part of its high-quality scrap; South Africa uses export taxes and licensing. Copper alloy scrap was 41.7% of EU copper scrap exports in 2025, and about 80% of it went to China and India. SMM expects wider regional price gaps and a gradual shift from raw scrap to ingots and anodes.
The number that matters is 41.7%: the share of EU copper scrap exports that is alloy scrap, the grade Europe has the least capacity to process at home. The EU rule bites from 2027; SMM says some new European capacity arrives in 2028 or later. That leaves a window in which brass and mixed scrap cannot leave easily and cannot be refined locally. Expect it to sit in yards at a discount, and expect Chinese and Indian buyers to bid harder for the high-grade scrap still free to move.
OFFTAKE | NICKEL
Swiss Steel Group and Canada Nickel Company announced a long-term strategic partnership that would give Swiss Steel exclusive access to about one million tonnes a year of low-carbon semi-finished steel, billets and blooms, from 2030, Mining Weekly reported. An initial supply concept has been technically validated for Swiss Steel's facilities in the United States, Canada, Germany, Switzerland and France. Canada Nickel is taking its Crawford project toward a construction decision in 2027; its subsidiary NetZero Metals plans to turn the concentrate into nickel and stainless and specialty steel.
One million tonnes a year from 2030 is a volume for a steel operation that does not exist yet, fed by a mine still waiting for its 2027 construction decision. The companies describe a partnership that will work toward a commercially viable deal: no price, no take-or-pay disclosed. Specialty steel buyers qualify billet grade by grade and plant by plant, here across five countries. The question for Crawford's financing is whether lenders count this as offtake coverage or as a letter of intent.
PRODUCTION | COPPER
China produced 1.147 million mt of copper cathode in August 2026, up 1.79% month on month and down 2.09% year on year, according to SMM data. SMM estimated September output at 1.139 million mt, citing maintenance at large smelters. August concentrate imports were 2.508 million physical mt, down 9.8% year on year, and the SMM imported concentrate spot TC index hit a record low of -$241.43/dmt. Recycled copper raw material imports fell 19.04% month on month to 177,400 mt.
A spot TC of -$241.43/dmt means Chinese smelters pay to receive concentrate, and August scrap imports fell 19.04% month on month. The fallback feed is drying up along with the primary one. Japan's answer is already visible in SMM's report: Mitsubishi Materials stops concentrate processing at Onahama by March 2027, and JX is spending about 7 billion yen to lift recycled pre-treatment by around 50%. Smelters are becoming scrap processors. Payability on No.1 and No.2 scrap is the price to watch, not cathode.
LICENSE EXTENSION | URANIUM
South Korea's Nuclear Safety and Security Commission has approved Korea Hydro & Nuclear Power's application to operate Kori units 3 and 4 for another 10 years, World Nuclear News reported. The two 1,025 MWe Westinghouse pressurised water reactors near Busan reached the end of their 40-year design lives in September 2024 and August 2025 and are offline. Unit 3 may now run to September 2034 and Unit 4 to August 2035. KHNP, which applied in November 2023, plans to restart both in the first half of 2027.
Two reactors with 2,050 MWe between them, offline since 2024 and 2025, are due back in the first half of 2027. A restart needs a fuel load on site before the switch. KHNP took three years to bring Kori 2 back after its permit lapsed; Kori 3 and 4 are on a similar clock. The signal for uranium and conversion is not the restart date but the fuel order behind it: whether KHNP already holds the fuel for two reloads or still has to buy it.
