Copper smelter. (Stock Image)
Chilean miner Antofagasta and a Chinese copper smelter have agreed treatment and refining charges (TC/RCs) for 2026 of $0 per metric ton and 0 cent per pound, two sources with knowledge of the matter said on Friday.
The deal, reached after protracted negotiations, compares with charges of $21.25 a ton and 2.125 cents per lb. for 2025 agreed last December and matches a mid-year settlement at zero.
The 2026 TC/RC terms are the lowest ever agreed in annual negotiations, but mean smelters avoid paying to process copper concentrate.
Talks between Antofagasta and smelters in China, the world’s biggest copper consumer, have been challenging this year, one of the sources said.
The sources declined to be identified or to name the smelter that agreed the deal because the negotiations were private.
Antofagasta did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Miners traditionally pay TC/RCs to smelters to cover the cost of converting copper concentrate into refined metal. The charges fall when mine supply tightens and smelters accept poorer terms to secure concentrate.
This year, outages at key mines – including Grasberg in Indonesia and Kamoa-Kakula in the Democratic Republic of Congo – have tightened supply so much that spot processing fees have turned negative, leaving smelters paying for what is normally a key source of revenue.
Late settlement
Jiangxi Copper, one of China’s biggest copper smelters and often the first to strike an annual TC/RC deal, had been due to hold a conference call with Antofagasta on Friday evening Beijing time, three separate sources familiar with the matter said earlier.
Other major Chinese smelters include Tongling Nonferrous, China Copper – a unit of state-owned Chinalco – and Jinchuan Group.
The two sides failed to reach agreement at Asia Copper Week in Shanghai last month, when an official from the China Nonferrous Metals Industry Association pushed back against “free and negative processing of copper concentrate.”
At the end of that week, the China Smelters Purchase Team (CSPT) – a group of key Chinese copper producers- said its members would cut production by more than 10% in 2026 to rebalance copper concentrate supply and demand.
(By Tom Daly, Pratima Desai, Amy Lv and Lewis Jackson; Editing by Kevin Liffey and Louise Heavens)