Grade 2 Titanium Prices October 20, 2026

Compiled from published spot assessments for the week ending October 19, 2026, ex-works China. USD conversions at approximately ¥6.70/USD. Foil and strip reflect small-volume specialty pricing.

The week's story sits in a ¥1,000 band. Sponge 0# came out of the holiday low at ¥43,000–44,000, and a brief wave of downstream restocking pushed posted ranges back to ¥44,000–45,000 by midweek. Then the bid disappeared. High-priced orders turned scarce by the weekend, ranges slipped back from the ¥45,000 test, and the tape closed at a ¥44,500 midpoint. A restocking pulse, not a demand turn.

Two forces capped it. First, downstream inventories are high across the board - mills bought hand-to-mouth through the slide, so the rebound met a channel that was already full. Second, the cost floor under sponge is getting softer: magnesium ingot is drifting lower and titanium tetrachloride edged down again, so the input-cost argument for holding ¥45,000 is weaker than a month ago. The support that did firm is behavioural - producers below their cost line before the holiday refuse to discount further, which is why ¥43,000–44,000 held as the floor.

Two weeks ago the market handed GR2 buyers a clean downward test: sponge dropped about ¥1,000/tonne into the holiday low and every published GR2 mill-product line printed unchanged. This week it handed them the mirror image: sponge recovered about ¥1,000/tonne and the ladder printed unchanged again. A price that does not follow its input down, and does not follow its input up, is a price not set by that input.

The arithmetic has not changed. In a 6 mm hot-rolled plate at ¥77/kg, the sponge content is roughly ¥44/kg and melting, casting and rolling add ¥33/kg of conversion, of which about ¥18/kg is fixed-cost recovery. A ¥1,000/tonne sponge move is about 1.3% of the finished price and roughly 3% of the conversion line - in either direction too small to be worth re-quoting. That is why the ladder has held flat through the entire post-holiday session while the metal underneath it round-tripped ¥2,000.

The most consequential news for the medium term is not in the weekly tape. A new full-chain sponge project with 60,000 tonnes of annual capacity - energy-grade material, integrated from upstream inputs through to sponge - produced its first batch in late September and has entered trial production. Capacity releases gradually, but the direction is fixed: more sponge supply is coming into the civil end of the market that is already the soft end.

For GR2 buyers the transmission is indirect but real. The new capacity will not touch qualified aerospace supply, but it will weigh on 1# and 2# grades and on civil ingot. That argues for ¥43,000–44,000 holding as the floor on the next dip - and for any rebound toward ¥45,000 remaining a selling opportunity, not a trend. The GR2 ladder is insulated by its conversion margin, but civil ingot offers could soften into Q4 and Q1 as the capacity ramps. Buyers of TA2 ingot and large-tonnage civil plate should be quoting annual volumes now, not spot.

Quote Bar / Tube / Strip / Foil

Chemical process equipment, plate and shell (ASTM B265). The ladder is flat and the next sponge leg is more likely down than up once new capacity ramps - but pass-through to finished plate is too small to wait for. Buy on lead time and specification, not the sponge index. Six millimetre hot-rolled at ¥77/kg remains the value rung; question any specification below 2 mm where the duty is corrosion containment rather than structural.

Thin-gauge sheet, strip, coil and foil. Nothing in this week's tape changes the constraint: line hours, not metal. If your 2027 programme is known, reserve rolling capacity now. Where a 0.5 mm call-out is habit rather than requirement, re-qualify upward to 1.0–1.5 mm - the ¥170/kg vs ¥110/kg spread is the largest single saving on the ladder.

Ingot, large-tonnage civil plate and project packages. This is the segment the new 60,000 t/yr capacity actually touches. Quote annual volume with a fixed-price element before the trial-production material lands in the civil market - buyer leverage on civil ingot improves with every ramp-up quarter. Marine and desalination packages: tender 50–500 tonnes with written validity, not spot. Certified GR2 (ISO 5832-2) still carries a 30–50% premium at 8–12 week lead times; lock the documentation before the price.