Posted on 08 Jun 2023
Billet export prices have risen in ASEAN, but regional end-users are so far staying on the sidelines, Kallanish notes. Weak finished steel demand in the region is preventing re-rollers from accepting the billet price increase, with traders the ones taking in cargoes in recent days.
Offers for 5sp grade 130mm/150mm square blast furnace billet for shipment by mid-August have risen to $530-540/tonne cfr Manila from $510-515/t cfr last week Friday. These are for Chinese and multiple ASEAN origins. “Offers have been relatively scarce,” a Manila trader says. Philippine buyers "will see first whether the trend will hold before jumping back into the fray.” A regional trader says offers have risen to around $535/t cfr and "no takers [are] responding" to the "big [price] jump".
Some hear of a booking for 3sp 150mm billet to Taiwan done last Friday at $485/t cfr. “It was for 20,000-25,000 tonnes. There are no offers over these past two days,” a Kaohsiung trader reported on Tuesday.
However, regional ASEAN mills have raised their offer prices by $20/t to $510/t fob for 3sp grade billet. An Indonesian mill is heard to have sold at $507/t fob. A regional trader hears that most of it went to Africa, and traders took the rest to cover earlier short sales.
Chinese trading sources say an export price of $507/t fob is reasonable. “It makes sense, with the domestic billet price in China at around RMB 3,500/t [$492/t], which is equivalent to above $500/t fob,” says a Shanghai trader. He doubts, though, that the price rally is sustainable and is watching the price uptrend.
Source:Kallanish
