RE: Tin nudging back up nicely...10 Mar 2021 17:03
the implication is that people are being forced to pay a premium for wanting it right away, rather than in 3 months time. In many things this is not unusual, think ryanair boarding - you pay extra to board 'now' - but the question here is why does anyone think that it will be any different in 3 months time - i.e. if in june you want to buy 'now' you may still be having to pay $3K more than if they were prepared to accept a 3 month lead time.
It does not seem unreasonable to offer lower prices if you are prepared to wait - thus if you are assuming that just because the 3 month price is less than it is for immediate delivery that this means that the Tin market thinks that the tin price is going to be $3k less in 3 months time - as I explained above this might not follow. The belief that it must follow is based on assumption that if it did not traders could buy lots of tin, store it for 3 months and then sell it on at higher prices.
This probably happens but the if it is only done at very low levels it may not be enough of a tail to wag the dog. It all depends on what fraction of the tin is being bought by people who actually want to use it, and what fraction by speculators. As the worldwide economies pick up and manufacturing of electronics, renewables and battery equipment picks up I suspect that quite a lot of the Tin is actually being taken by the manufacturers rather than traders.