US service centers shipped 106,200 st of aluminum products in December, down 5.3% from the 112,100 st shipped in December 2015, data from the Metals Service Center Institute showed Wednesday.
Service center inventories at the end of December were 384,100 st, representing 3.6 months of supply. This was down 2.3% from inventories of 393,300 st (3.5 months of supply) at the end of December 2015, the MSCI said.
In the whole of 2016, US service centers shipped 1.5 million st of aluminum products, down 4.2% from the 1.57 million st shipped in 2015.
In Canada, service centers shipped 7,500 st of aluminum products, excluding extrusions, in December, down 1% from the 7,600 st shipped in December 2015. Canadian service center inventories at the end of December were 30,500 st (4.1 months of supply), down 0.8% from 30,700 st (4.1 months supply) at the end of December 2015.
Full-year Canadian service center aluminum shipments were 122,400 st in 2016, down 10.5% from 136,800 st shipped in the whole of 2015, the MSCI data showed.
