Daily Market Note — 2026-09-18

Market commentary on the global ferrous scrap trade. Not trading advice.

The read

Pakistan’s imported shredded market held its recent level for a seventh session, with an independent publisher reporting a booking inside the same band. Gulf shipping risk ticked up off its recent low even as the reference traffic average itself kept falling — a genuinely mixed signal rather than a one-directional move.

No fresh Pakistan shredded transaction was reported through the day’s cut-off, leaving the market anchored around $418/MT CFR Port Qasim with a recent range of $417–420/MT and asks near $420, premium targets $425. A separate publisher (SteelOrbis) reported a recent ex-UK shredded booking concluded at $417–418/MT CFR Port Qasim, sitting inside that same band. Strait of Hormuz commodity-vessel crossings rose to four, up from the prior session’s low of three, but the ten-day reference average itself eased to sixteen — traffic remains well below normal even as the daily count ticked up. Fastmarkets’ first Pakistan shredded assessment under its revised Friday-only publication schedule was due today, but the numeric value was not publicly accessible as of the research cut-off. Regional commentary described Turkey’s imported scrap market as approaching a three-month high on tight supply and higher freight, while India’s scrap-price signals were mixed session to session.

Key moves

• Pakistan imported shredded — no new transaction reported for a seventh straight session; anchor holds near $418/MT CFR Port Qasim; working range $417–420/MT CFR; asks near $420, premium targets $425; an independent publisher’s reported booking ($417–418/MT) sits inside that range.
• Turkey — imported scrap described as approaching a three-month high on tight supply and higher freight.
• India — scrap-price signals were mixed: one index eased slightly while a separate regional reference firmed the following session.
• Currency and fuel — the Pakistani rupee traded around 277 to the US dollar, essentially stable; retail petrol eased slightly for the first time in several weeks while diesel rose again.

Freight and shipping

Hormuz vessel traffic and its own reference average moved in opposite directions today — a genuinely mixed signal rather than clean escalation or clean easing.

• Strait of Hormuz: commodity-vessel crossings rose to four, from a recent low of three, while the ten-day reference average itself eased to sixteen, from eighteen.
• Other routes: a small number of LNG vessels were reported to have reappeared outside Hormuz; traffic through Bab el-Mandeb held broadly steady.
• Oil: Brent crude recovered from an intraday low to trade around $104.5/bbl, with continued reports of alternative loading arrangements easing some regional supply concern.
• Destination operations: Port Qasim’s official shipping programme showed active container and bulk vessel operations today, with no reported cancellations.
• Carrier surcharges: the revised Far East Asia → Pakistan peak-season surcharge of $2,000 per 40ft/45ft container remains in force and now explicitly covers South Korea-origin cargo; the Middle East → Pakistan surcharge of $2,050 per 20ft and $3,500 per 40ft/45ft remains unchanged.

Supplier markets

A temporary UAE restriction on ferrous, copper, and aluminium scrap exports remains scheduled through 8 October. The EU’s non-OECD waste-shipment framework is unchanged today, with the Commission’s first published list of authorised non-OECD countries still due by 21 November 2026, and the separate e-waste export ban to non-OECD countries in force since 1 January 2025. Fastmarkets’ Pakistan shredded index remains on its new weekly (Friday) schedule; today’s first assessment under that schedule was due but not yet publicly accessible.

Non-ferrous snapshot

Overnight LME reference levels: copper traded around $14,400/t, up for a second consecutive session; zinc traded around $3,860/t, also firmer; aluminium traded around $3,285/t, little changed. Separate China physical spot references for copper, aluminium, and zinc ran well above these exchange levels, consistent with the usual domestic-premium gap between a Chinese spot market and the international exchange benchmark rather than any dislocation.

Glossary

• CFR — cost and freight; the seller pays ocean freight to the destination port, the buyer carries insurance and transit risk.
• Port Qasim — Pakistan’s main deep-water import terminal, near Karachi.
• Shredded — processed scrap of consistent size and density, the main containerised grade into Pakistan.
• PSS / ECS — peak season surcharge / emergency contingency surcharge, temporary carrier charges added to base ocean freight, quoted per container.
• LME 3M — the London Metal Exchange’s three-month forward reference price, the standard benchmark for base-metal scrap formulas.
• Non-OECD waste-shipment rules — EU regulations governing which countries outside the OECD may receive specified waste exports, including scrap metal, from EU member states.