Calcium Carbonate Prices Demonstrate a Steep Northward Trend Entering August 2022

Mumbai, India: In the Indian domestic market, the price trend of Calcium Carbonate has risen significantly by double-digit figures in the first week of August 2022. As per the latest data, the price discussions of Calcium Carbonate have observed a steep northward trend and have shown an increment of approximately 10 USD per ton on August 5th, 2022 compared to last week’s observed costs.

The escalated input costs for Calcium Carbonate triggered by dollar domination and aggravated by supply shortages in the food and energy markets released by Russia’s invasion of Ukraine have prompted the imbalance in expenditure and revenues. In developed economies, consumer price inflation has been ranging above 9%. In India, to combat rising inflation, the Reserve Bank of India has increased the repo rates by 50 base points, or half a per cent. The front-loading of surged rates has further tightened the financial terms between India and developed economies, impacting the capital costs of significant energy materials.

Furthermore, despite the monsoon season blockade, the Indian calcium carbonate industry has been maintained by solid demand fundamentals due to active enquiries from domestic and overseas infrastructure firms. However, the manufacturing sector has been observed confronting rising input and logistics costs, which has majorly impacted the enterprises’ profit margins in the previous quarters. As a result, the top market player in India, Shree Cement’s EBITDA margin, has plummeted by nearly ten percentage points year-on-year in the second quarter to 18.15 per cent. Furthermore, the cement giant ACC has also reported a decline of 13.1 percentage points YoY to 9.7 per cent in the same timeframe.

As per ChemAnalyst, the price trends of Calcium Carbonate are anticipated to remain buoyant and will edge higher in the near term. The unravelling tension between US-China and Taiwan and the menace of the global slowdown are likely to impact the raw material arbitrage globally, fuelling the price dynamics of Calcium Carbonate to soar further in the forthcoming weeks.