WEEKLY: Tangshan billet price up on consumption spree
“We’ve been operating at the full capacity, even though our margins are narrow, only at around Yuan 30-40/t because of high billet price,” a rebar re-roller in Tangshan, North China’s Hebei province said.
Tangshan, home to 36 integrated steel mills and nearly 200 steel re-rollers, and the latter have been increasing their output since the production ban during the winter months was lifted at the end of March.
The rolling capacity utilization rate at the 12 rebar re-rollers in Tangshan under Mysteels’ weekly survey, therefore, rose to 23.4% on average as of April 10 from zero at the end of March, and billet stocks in Tangshan, has been depleting fast, with the volume at 11 trading houses and two ports in Tangshan down 121,500 tonnes or 16.2% on week to 635,800 tonnes as of April 11.
Over the period, billet inventories at 33 re-rollers in Tangshan declined too by 37,000 tonnes or 8.7% on week to 386,000 tonnes as of April 11.
“(Billet) trading was great throughout last week and producers’ billet output has been fully booked, and some mills have even received pre-booking,” a Tangshan market source said.
Robust sales of billet and price rises at the same time saw the margin in billet sales among the ten steel mills in Tangshan under Mysteel’s weekly survey rose further by Yuan 90/t on week to Yuan 616/t.
In the near term, Tangshan billet market may stay rather vibrant as most of the Tangshan re-rollers having been striving to increase output instead of being ordered by the local government to take turns to restrict their capacity utilization in April to contribute to air quality improvement, as reported.
Written by Lindsey Liu, liulingxian@mysteel.com, and Olivia Zhang, zhangwd@mysteel.com
Edited by Hongmei Li, li.hongmei@mysteel.com
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