PRESS ROOM
Industrial metals down as risk-off sentiment continues in markets
Thursday 15th September '22
Risk sentiment turned bearish again following comments from Jerome Powell at the Jackson Hole Symposium at the end of August. As equities pulled back, so did industrial metals. To overcome this broader sell-off in markets amid fears of recession, industrial metals needed some glimmer of positive economic data. Unfortunately, that did not materialise. Typically, manufacturing activity in China, the world’s largest consumer of industrial metals, has a notable bearing on metal prices. China’s Manufacturing Purchasing Managers’ Index (PMI) went into contractionary territory in August after being expansionary for the two preceding months. Thus, the reprieve industrial metals experienced in the second half of July, disappeared in August.