With the US’s Section 232 (S232) investigation into critical minerals having likely concluded (albeit not yet made public), our base case is that PGMs are unaffected since disrupting imports may harm high value-add domestic manufacturing sectors. This aligns with the US reducing tariffs from China to maintain rare earth imports. However, the threshold for an adverse S232 recommendation is relatively low, meaning that PGM tariffs or import quotas cannot be totally ruled out.Tariff fears have led to significant US onshoring of PGMs by end users and speculators. CME warehoused platinum stocks have increased by ~350 koz year-to-date and assuming no trade barriers arise are expected to unwind back to levels similar to the beginning of 2025 by the end of 2026f.However, if the S232 report affirms harm and Trump enacts some combination of import quotas and/or tariffs, onshored metal may remain trapped in the US. This would exacerbate our forecast platinum market deficit in 2025f.Figure 5. If year-to-date exchange stock inflows stay at current levels, the 2025 deficit increases from 692 koz to 891 koz, if they unwind it reduces to 542 koz. If they persist into 2026 the market would be in a 329 koz deficit, if they unwind, the surplus increases to 219 kozSource: Metals Focus, CME, Bloomberg Finance L.P., WPIC research, N.B. unwind is to the start of 2025 level of 270 koz, not to zero
