Novelis Inc. president and chief executive officer, Phil Martens, issued the following statement in response to a ruling by the UK High Court regarding planned changes to aluminum warehousing rules by the London Metal Exchange (LME):
“We are very disappointed with the outcome of the legal process in the UK,” said Martens.
“It is indefensible that queues of more than a year exist at warehouses, and unconscionable that players in the aluminum market are actively working to maintain the status quo to protect artificially inflated premiums. The divergence between the LME price and the physical market price is undermining the credibility of the industry’s pricing discovery process and causing havoc in the fabricating and consuming end of the industry. This is a global issue.
“This recent legal action taken outside of the LME’s consultation process is grievous – it sanctions the continuation of this destructive regime. At the same time, the producers are continuing to make outsized windfall gains, which a year ago we estimated to be $3 billion, but are now twice that level. This exploitation of an artificial market squeeze appears to us to be blatant, and the effects are being felt further down the supply chain and ultimately by the end consumer.
Published in the June 2014 Edition of American Recycler News