WEEKLY: China's HRC output edges up further, price rally continues

Hot-rolled coil (HRC) production among the 37 Chinese steelmakers regularly surveyed by Mysteel climbed further by 31,000 tonnes or 1% on week to 3.06 million tonnes during April 16-22 after a hot strip mill at an East China-based steel mill resumed operations last week, Mysteel’s survey showed.

During the survey week, the capacity utilization rate of the hot strip mills operated by the 37 sampled mills rose 0.79 percentage point to 78.1%, while their average operation rate also recovered by 1.56 percentage points to 79.69%. The higher output caused hot coil inventories held by the 37 surveyed mills to rise