The three-month futures price of nickel on the London Metal Exchange (LME) kept rising by US$271/ton yesterday (April 26), closing at US$16,666/ton, and the spot price also hiked by US$274.5/ton to US$16,627.75/ton.

Meanwhile, LME’s market inventory of nickel decreased by 642 tons to 263,556 tons.

According to market participants, nickel prices kept climbing as China’s stainless steel inventory has dropped for eight weeks and both China’s stainless steel futures prices and spot prices hiked.

Due to the improvement in China’s stainless steel market, nickel prices were expected to fluctuate stably in the short term.