WEEKLY: China steel FOB prices up on better global market
Over August 29-September 4, China's export offering prices of SS400 4.75mm hot-rolled coil (HRC) averaged at $517/tonne FOB North China's Tianjin port, up for another $5/t on week, that of the SPCC 1mm cold rolled coil (CRC) increased $13/t on week to $572/t FOB Tianjin port, and the B500B 18-25mm rebar offering for exports inched up $3/t on week to $485/t FOB Zhangjiagang port, East China, according to Mysteel's weekly assessment.
China's steel export offering prices have been rising steadily since around late May, a couple of months earlier than the price strengthening elsewhere in the world due to its rather robust domestic market, Mysteel Global noted.
"Global steelmakers have been actively planning for resumption or stepping up ouput, which has boosted the steelmaking raw material prices, and as result, the steel mills have to raise their finished steel offering prices to reflect high production cost especially when the better demand has made this possible," a steel analyst based in Shanghai noted.
In Europe, for example, ArcelorMittal planned to resume two blast furnaces with a combined 5.7 million tonnes/year capacity in France and Spain in September after the resumption of a 3 million t/y blast furnace in Dunkirk of France in August, according to the company.
Despite higher offering prices, Chinese suppliers had struck deals of cold-rolled coils/sheets as well as a few deals of HRC too, according to the Shanghai analyst. "The demand recovery in a few countries is encouraging and in some regions, there is all of sudden some supply tightness due to lower output in the past couple of months," he added.
In contrast, China's steel imports have been cooling down from the buying spree in July mainly because of the too fast rises in the import prices, and the offering prices of some products have surpassed those of domestic supplies, a steel importer from East China's Zhejiang province shared.
As of September 8, the 5SP billets from India are offered at around $455/t CFR China for November shipments, according to him, which is higher than China's Q235 150mm square billet price at Yuan 3,480/t ($509.5/t) EXW and including the 13% VAT, according to Mysteel's assessment.
Chinese steel market sources, thus, predict China's steel imports volume in October to decline sharply and the tonnage may return to the normal level prior to the pandemic outbreak in November at around 1 million tonnes/month.
In August, China's steel imports totalled 2.24 million tonnes, down slightly from a record monthly high of 2.6 million tonnes in July, as reported.
Written by Olivia Zhang, zhangwd@mysteel.com and Lyn Mao, maol@mysteel.com
Edited by Hongmei Li, li.hongmei@mysteel.com
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