(Updating with market comment, company background and aluminium price)
London 10/12/2015 - China Hongqiao will cut 250,000 tonnes of primary aluminium production with immediate effect, the company confirmed on Thursday.
The move follows a meeting of 14 of China's major aluminium smelters that was held today amid continued weak prices.
But given estimated global aluminium output of 57 million tonnes this year, of which China will accounts for around 28 million tonnes, even a cut of this magnitude is unlikely to have a significant effect on prices, local observers said.
"The cut cannot reverse the overall [oversupplied] situation. The situation cannot be changed if consumption remains weak," a local source said.
"I don’t think there will be any substantial influence mainly because the total amount produced by Chinese producers is huge," another trader noted.
Three-month LME aluminium recently traded at $1,483 per tonne, down $7 on Wednesday's close and not far from a recent six-and-a-half-year low of $1,432.
China Hongqiao, a leading aluminium product manufacturer in China, is mainly engaged in the production and sales of aluminium alloy ingots, aluminium alloy casting-rolling products and aluminium busbars.
Earlier this week, China's Ministry of Finance decided to retain its 15-percent export tax on primary aluminium.
(Additional report by Ian Walker and Ewa Manthey, editing by Mark Shaw)