Posted on 01 Sep 2023
China’s biggest listed steelmaker Baoshan Iron & Steel 600019.SS on Wednesday reported a 41.6% fall in net profit in the first half of 2023, after sluggish steel demand reduced revenue while high raw material prices ate into profitability.
The company said in a filing to the Shanghai Stock Exchange that it earned 4.55 billion yuan ($624 million) in the first six months of the year, down from 7.79 billion in the same period of 2022.
Baosteel is a subsidiary of state-owned China Baowu Steel Group, the world’s largest steelmaker by output.
The steelmaker’s sales revenue in the first half of the year dropped 7.5% on an annual basis to 169.9 billion yuan. Its shares fell 1.13% to 6.1 yuan a share.
“Domestic steel demand has been gloomy so far this year, and the recovery in demand from sectors including property, automobiles, engineering as well as containers is slower than expected,” Baosteel said in its interim report.
Though prices of steelmaking ingredients including iron ore and coal posted year-on-year declines in the half year, the falling pace of steel product prices exceeded those of raw materials amid sluggish downstream demand.
Steel demand is expected to improve to some degree in the second half of the year thanks to measures introduced to stabilize economic growth, but output will fall due to the implementation of energy consumption and environmental protection-related measures, according to Baosteel.
Overseas steel demand as well as prices have been on the decline, which will affect steel exports, it added.
Baosteel produced 24.27 million metric tons of pig iron and 25.94 million tons of steel from January through June.
China manufactured 535.64 million metric tons of crude steel over the same period, a year-on-year rise of 1.3%, official data showed.
Source:Reuters
