On 18 August, China’s Ministry of Commerce (MOFCOM) announced export controls on a variety of forms of antimony including antimony ore, metal, and oxides. The decision was made “…in order to safeguard national security and interests and fulfil international obligations such as non-proliferation”.  

The restrictions, which come into effect 15 September, echo those imposed on the gallium, germanium and graphite supply chains.

In this opinion piece, Project Blue reflects on the likely impact of the restrictions on an antimony market which is already experiencing high prices brought about by limited raw material availability.

Restrictions on antimony ore

China is by far the largest source of mined antimony, although its output has been in decline since reaching a peak of over 160kt Sb in 2007. Project Blue put Chinese mine production at 50kt Sb in 2023. Falling output in China has been underpinned by declining reserves and lower-grade ores.

As a result of declining domestic supply, Chinese refineries have increasingly sourced antimony concentrates from other countries. Russia and Tajikistan have been the most prominent sources of additional antimony mine supply to enter the market. Output from these countries is now largely refined in China. However, growth in supply outside of China has not matched the decline of domestic Chinese output. Rather, it has been growing secondary antimonial lead recycling together with increasing lower-purity antimony by-products recovered from primary lead ores that has kept the antimony market in balance.

Russia leapfrogged Tajikistan in antimony mine production in 2018, when Russia’s largest gold producer, Polyus, started to recover gold-rich antimony concentrates from its Olimpiada mine. However, output from Olimpiada has remained below 2018 levels and volatile ever since, except for a resurgence in 2023 after two consecutive years of a supply deficit.

Polyus’ 2023 output increase did little, however, to ease concentrate tightness in China. Instead, significant volumes of concentrate remain stockpiled in Russia, which planned to remove export duties from gold concentrates from 1 June 2024 and shift these to extraction taxes for miners to support its military funds. The expectation of the removal of export taxes is assumed to have caused lower exports of existing concentrates in Q2 2024. However, ongoing sanctions on Russia from the West has seen Chinese banks suspend payments to Russia, which has delayed the expected feedstock relief from China’s largest source of antimony concentrates.[NB1] 

To combat a growing deficit, China has ramped up sourcing additional feedstock from Myanmar, despite ongoing conflict in the country impacting direct trade routes into China. The majority of antimony concentrates from Myanmar have made it to China via Thailand, closer to the southern antimony mines. Vietnam has also received additional feedstock via Thailand, as smelters there are also reliant on Russian feedstock.

As China is a net importer of antimony ore, the restrictions on ore exports will not have a direct impact. Nonetheless, should restrictions push prices higher there could be indirect consequences. Higher prices could see low-grade deposits in China (which has recently approved new mines for the first time in recent years) become economic and support a short-lived uptick in Chinese supply. 

Restrictions on antimony metal and oxide

The impact on higher-value antimony products could be more significant. 

China was, until recently, by far the largest exporter of antimony ingot and a major source to global refiners (who use Chinese metal to make chemical products such as antimony trioxide (ATO)). Chinese material was typically sent to the USA, Japan, Korea and to Europe where it was consumed by the leading producers of ATO and other chemical products. 

However, China has recently been cutting down on its ingot exports as producers of antimony trioxide in the country have been consuming the bulk of Chinese material domestically. In response, European ATO refiners have looked to Tajikistan, Vietnam, and Myanmar as an alternative to Chinese ingot feed, while US consumers have mostly looked to India. Tajikistan and Myanmar both produced more “saleable ingot” than China in 2023, according to Project Blue estimates, as Chinese smelters had limited ingot production available for the international market.

With this in mind, the new restrictions will have a much more limited impact than if they were imposed in 2022 or before, but they will still doubtless have an impact on global material availability which is likely to impact prices. The ban does address a growing need in China for every ingot produced to be available for domestic consumption. The lack of concentrate and resulting lack of ingot production to meet the growing demand for antimony chemicals underpins the rapid increase in prices that currently characterises the market.

With regard to ATO, China remains the largest source of supply globally, accounting for 60-70% of annual output since 2003. The country’s market share has moved above 70% since 2022 and ATO production moved close to its previous 2008 record (86kt) in 2022 and 2023 with supply returning to over 85ktpy.

Supply increases for ATO were supported by by-product supply from domestic lead smelters, increasingly supplying into the lower-grade specification chemicals industry. Together with rising secondary supply reducing the requirement of primary ores for metallurgical antimony applications, ATO production has maintained steady levels, despite declining concentrate availability.

Chinese exports of ATO fell back a little from typical levels in 2023 but still totalled above 11kt, with the USA, India, Korea, Japan and Taiwan representing the top five destinations for Chinese material. Consumers in these countries would most likely be worst affected if the new restrictions were to come into force for a significant period.

Concluding thoughts

The impact on the concentrate and metal markets may be more subdued than expected, given that China is already producing less and exporting less of these forms of antimony compared to a few years ago, and because producers in countries such as Tajikistan and Myanmar have, to an extent, filled the void. The impact could be felt more in the ATO market – but time will tell.

With the market already witnessing high prices owing to raw material tightness and the feedstock market the least impacted by the announcement, it is unlikely that prices will experience another fundamental increase as a result of the restrictions. Short-term volatility, however, is expected and with the potential risk lying more toward ATO, we could expect to see the premium of ATO prices widen as a result. As has been the case with gallium, more divergence between Western and Chinese prices may be expected too if access to material becomes more squeezed outside of China.