TDC Ventures

Daily Market Note — 2026-10-30

3 min read

Daily Market Note — 2026-10-30

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

The read

Friday’s weekly Pakistan shredded print is the event to watch; until it is published the reference level is unchanged. The CFR Port Qasim shredded price (Fastmarkets MB-STE-0887) stands at 415.35 USD per tonne for 23 October, up 1.28 from 414.07 a week earlier. The index is now assessed weekly on Fridays at 16:00 London time, so the 30 October value was not available at the time of writing. No second public price exists: the daily Turkish and Pakistan entries from other publishers do not show a public number. Oil is higher and base metals slightly softer, but none of that has yet appeared in a published scrap price.

Key moves

  • Pakistan reference price — 415.35 USD per tonne (23 October), inside the 410–417 band of recent weeks; the next print is due today after the London afternoon.
  • Oil — ICE front-month Brent was about 117.64 USD a barrel on 30 October, against 113.88 on 27 October, a rise of roughly 3%. Higher oil lifts bunker and insurance costs on Gulf-adjacent lanes.
  • Pakistan policy rate — the State Bank of Pakistan rate remains 12.00% (raised from 11.50%, effective 27 October). Higher borrowing costs can limit the credit headroom mills have for long-lead cargoes; no change in mill letter-of-credit terms has been verified.
  • Rupee — the State Bank’s mark-to-market reference was about 276.76 per US dollar on 29 October; commercial bank rates differ.

Freight and shipping

Active Gulf navigation warnings (US NGA) are unchanged at 19, so that gauge does not show added Gulf risk even with oil higher. No carrier war-risk surcharge or insurer exclusion on Pakistan-bound container services has been verified. Scrap into Pakistan moves in 20-foot containers at about 25 tonnes; any freight comparison for Pakistan should use that box, and global container indexes are not Pakistan rates.

Supplier markets

  • EU — the Commission’s September draft authorisation list for non-OECD waste destinations does not propose Pakistan for metal waste. It is a draft, with a first list expected by the end of 2026; the regime applies from 21 May 2027. This is a medium-term risk for EU-origin supply, not a current ban.
  • UK and US origins — the two origins buyers are weighing as alternatives for 2027 programmes. Each still needs its own export, Basel and destination-import review.
  • Pakistan demand — September imports were 427,880 tonnes (+18.3% on August, +16.7% on a year earlier), per figures SteelOrbis reported on 16 October. That measures past intake, not current mill buying.

Non-ferrous snapshot

Official LME cash prices (Westmetall) for Thursday 29 October, USD per tonne: copper 14,560, aluminium 3,071 and zinc 3,980. Metals.dev’s LME-linked feed for 30 October shows copper 14,350 (down 85), aluminium 3,064 (flat) and zinc 3,880 (up 50), which are feed readings rather than official settlements. Exchange prices are references, not scrap prices; scrap pays by assay, recovery and the contractual fixing date.

Glossary

  • CFR — cost and freight: the seller pays ocean freight to the destination port; the buyer carries insurance and transit risk.
  • CFR Port Qasim shredded price (MB-STE-0887) — the Fastmarkets index for shredded scrap delivered to Port Qasim, Pakistan’s main deep-water import terminal near Karachi.
  • NGA navigation warnings — active maritime warnings published by the US National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency, used here as a rough gauge of Gulf shipping risk.
  • Non-OECD authorised-country list — the EU list of non-OECD countries permitted to receive its waste exports under the revised Waste Shipment Regulation.
  • LME — London Metal Exchange, the benchmark venue behind most base-metal scrap pricing formulas.

Graph View