SANTIAGO, April 17 (Reuters) - Aurubis AG ,
Europe's largest copper smelter and producer, no longer buys the
red metal from Russia after it let supply contracts lapse, its
CEO told Reuters on Monday.
Russia's invasion of Ukraine last year fueled a range of
boycotts, sanctions and other measures against copper and other
metals from the country.
Aurubis, which is not a miner, but refines and recycles
copper into wire and other components, had contracts for Russian
supply of the red metal that it did not renew when they recently
ended, Aurubis CEO Roland Harings said on the sidelines of the
World Copper Conference in Santiago, the copper industry's
largest gathering since 2019.
"We are not buying Russian copper anymore. It's completely
out of our system," he said. Harings had asked the London Metal
Exchange last October to impose a ban on Russian metal due to
risk of warehouses filling up. Copper supply contracts typically
end on a calendar-year basis.
Russia in 2021 - the year before the invasion - supplied
Germany-based Aurubis and the entire European Union with nearly
292,000 tonnes of an 801,000 tonnes of imported copper,
according to data from Trade Data Monitor.
Despite that amount, the copper market has pivoted to new
sources of the red metal and Aurubis does not have supply
concerns, Harings said.
"We have been able without real problems to replace the
Russian copper units that we were buying with other sources,"
Harings said.
Elsewhere, Harings said the broader copper market was
generally healthy and noted that Aurubis is reporting strong
demand, especially for cable and other products for the green
energy transition.
"There are significant demands for many, many years to come
for copper," Harings said.
(Reporting by Ernest Scheyder; Editing by Josie Kao)
+1-713-210-8512; Reuters Messaging:
ernest.scheyder.thomsonreuters.com@reuters.net))
