The Western China (Guangyuan) Aluminum Ingot Trade Center celebrated over 100 days of operation on Aug 9, with a business volume exceeding 50,000 tons and a trade value exceeding one billion yuan ($137 million).

The Western China (Guangyuan) Aluminum Ingot Trading Center [Photo/cbgc.scol.com.cn]

The aluminum ingot trade center provides ample aluminum ingot raw materials for aluminum enterprises, facilitating their development and production.

Boosting efficiency and reducing costs

The aluminum ingot trade center in Guangyuan integrates such functions as warehousing, exhibition and transaction, logistics distribution, and financial services. It covers an area of 7.33 hectares and can store more than 30,000 tons of aluminum ingots on a regular basis.

Enterprises find it more convenient, and transportation is faster.

Workers produce aluminum products in a manufacturing shop. [Photo/cbgc.scol.com.cn]

Aluminum ingots are transported from production enterprises and trade warehouses to downstream enterprises in as little as 10 minutes, effectively reducing logistic and operating costs.

In addition to trading business, the center also serves as a futures market.

Zhang Jingyang, head of Sichuan Jiuda New Material Technology Co., Ltd., said that the company's aluminum ingots can be pledged to the trade center, which not only helps companies manage inventory and adjust prices reasonably, but also accelerates a new round of financing for companies to expand production.

Up to now, the aluminum ingot trade center has invested more than 190 million yuan to provide operating capital support for electrolytic aluminum enterprises and downstream aluminum processing enterprises, reducing the average capital cost of enterprises by 3-4 percent.

Strengthening Regional Cooperation

Guangyuan has built a complete aluminum industrial chain for green hydropower,  deep processing, and comprehensive utilization. Under the premise of no increase in production capacity, it is necessary to further strengthen downstream processing enterprises in the aluminum industrial chain.

Workers produce aluminum products in a manufacturing shop. [Photo/cbgc.scol.com.cn]

As the local production capacity falls short, the aluminum ingot trade center has signed an aluminum ingot purchase agreement of more than two million tons, ensuring a stable supply of raw materials for more aluminum deep processing enterprises.

The center will coordinate with relevant departments, striving to open up a railway train route between Urumqi, Xinjiang Uyghur autonomous region, and Guangyuan, Sichuan province, establish a special railway line for aluminum ingots and supporting warehouses, set up purchasing stations, and strive for preferential tax policies.

Efforts will also be made to strengthen regional cooperation, actively promote the aluminum industry in Guangyuan, and improve the core competitiveness of the industrial cluster.

"We are still actively striving for Guangyuan to have the pricing power of aluminum ingots," said Li Jijun, head of the aluminum ingot trade center. The center will connect with the Shanghai Futures Exchange and set up a Guangyuan aluminum ingot futures delivery warehouse, allowing Guangyuan to have more voice trade in the national aluminum industry.