Price of tinplate is questioned on sidelines of conference

Factiva: "On the sidelines of the Metal Bulletin 9th International Tinplate Conference Tuesday in Istanbul, traders struggled to settle a benchmark tinplate price in the face of the global market turmoil.

One trade source said that there was talk by certain producers of cutting tinplate production completely. 'There has been talk before that tinplate production by certain producers could be axed all together,' said the trade source. A second trade source said that he was happy to still be employed, saying: 'At this moment in time, that's the main thing.' Innovation was one of the key themes of the conference, but a third source told Platts: 'It's all very well talking about innovation, that's a given, but is it being implemented?' All three traders stressed the importance of pegging the true price of tinplate/mt. 'I have heard 0.18 at around $1,800/mt and $1,200/mt for 0.32,' the first source said. The second trader agreed with the assessment."