Posted on 03 Apr 2023
The Philippines billet import market continues to falter, Kallanish notes. Buyers are staying away because they have bearish sentiment and domestic demand for rebar is still sluggish.
Most offers for 5sp grade 130mm/150mm square billet from ASEAN and China are prevailing at $600-610/tonne cfr Manila. A Manila importer reported on Friday that a trader was offering Indonesian 5sp 130mm blast furnace billet for May shipment at $595/t cfr. “Demand [for rebar] is slow and buyers are not sure if the market will continue to come down,” the re-roller said. Offers for Chinese-origin 150mm 3sp billet were at $605-610/t cfr during the previous week, through 24 March.
“The market is very soft,” a Manila trader says. He is seeing offers for 130mm 5sp billet from ASEAN at $600/t cfr. He notes that suppliers want to “offload as early as possible because they see that the market is not on their side”. He has heard Vietnamese-origin induction furnace billet concluded at $575/t cfr Manila.
The supplier for a Thai induction furnace billet cargo was asking for a $585/t cfr bid, another Manila trader says. “At the end of the day, it depends on traders and traders’ level of desperation to secure a sale,” he explains. He hears the market situation in Vietnam “is getting dire”.
In addition to international factors including the recent global banking crisis and weakness in EU demand, the ASEAN region is facing sluggish demand amid the start of the Ramadan season. “Next week, our market will be even more dead due to the long Easter holidays,” the second Manila trader says.
Kallanish assessed 5sp/ps or Q275 120/125/130mm square billet at $595-600/t cfr Manila, down $15 on-week.
Source:Kallanish
