US aluminium tariff fails to affect China’s April aluminium product shipments

China's exports of aluminium increased in April as U.S. import tariffs failed to have any strong impact on outbound shipments from the country, Reuters reported.China exported 451,000 tonnes of unwrought aluminium and aluminium product last month, a 0.2 per cent increase from 450,000 tonnes exported in March and up 4.9 per cent from 430,000 tonnes in April 2017, according to the General Administration of Customs.

Aluminium prices jumped 12.5 per cent on the London Metal Exchange last month after US imposed sanctions on Rusal, the world’s second-biggest aluminium producer.

The United States imposed a 10 per cent tariff on aluminium imports, effective from March 23 as U.S. President Donald Trump sought to protect domestic producers. The United States accounts for 14 percent of China's total aluminium exports. 

 “Exports are still happening, which suggests the tariff is not really having a material impact at this point,” said Lachlan Shaw, a metals analyst at UBS in Melbourne.

“Certainly anecdotal reporting from within the U.S. aluminium products manufacturing sector suggests that some fabricators are just paying the tariffs to secure the required imports. So it appears that trade is holding up for now,” he added.