zinc thoughtA poster on another board mentions Red Dog zinc shipments.
So I went to Tech's web site. Red Dog has been shipping since early July this year which is several weeks earlier than in 2006. They ship to smelters for about 100 days to clear their inventory and to beat the winter freeze up in Alaska. I think the industry must have known/experienced this all summer hence the current lower zinc prices. In early October, the shipments abruptly finish. My thinking is that the zinc price leads the LME inventory figures by a few months. That is, the price predicts the future inventory level and not vice-versa. So zinc price should at least firm up in October. That would also explain why it is possible to get decent futures prices if Tam elects for that option. The industry has already factored all that in.
Tech also talks about their commercial lead inventories at the end of June. They were all sold out.