Posted on 22 Mar 2023
Rebar prices in Shanghai's futures market continued falling on March 21. On the one hand, market sentiment was unsettled by the global banking crisis while on the other, mills were active in concluding deals after their margins on steel sales had improved, sources said.
The price of the most-traded rebar contract on the Shanghai Futures Exchange (SHFE) for May delivery tumbled for the second trading day on Tuesday, declining by Yuan 77/tonne ($11.2/t) or 1.8% from the prior day's settlement price to close the daytime trading session on March 21 at Yuan 4,156/t. This was also Yuan 216/t or 4.9% lower on week.
"The banking risks in the U.S and Europe have yet to subside," commented a Shanghai-based analyst, noting that the uncertainty caused weak sentiment to prevail in the market.
"Though the governments of some steelmaking cities such as Tangshan and Handan (in North China's Hebei province) had announced additional production curbs in the last few days on many local mills' sintering operations to lessen air pollution, deliveries from some makers to the market were active as mills capitalized on improved profit margins," he added.
Mysteel's survey among the 247 blast-furnace and 87 electric-arc-furnace steel producers it tracks nationwide showed that China's daily crude steel output climbed further by 1.1% during mid-March to hit a nine-month high of 2.98 million tonnes/day on average, as reported.
Meanwhile, "the slides in prices of steelmaking raw materials have also dragged down finished steel prices," according to the source, noting that iron ore prices have succumbed to pressure from the central government's intensified price supervision.
On March 21, the most-traded iron ore contract on the Dalian Commodity Exchange for May delivery dropped further by Yuan 20/dmt or 2.2% from the previous day's settlement price to close at Yuan 879/dmt by the end of the daytime session.
As for spot rebar prices, the price of HRB400E 20mm rebar in Shanghai was assessed by Mysteel at Yuan 4,320/t including the 13% VAT on March 20, down Yuan 30/t from that on March 17.
Source:Mysteel Global
