Posted on 18 Sep 2024
Malaysian exports of billet and slab have risen significantly this year, Kallanish notes. Turkey is the main recipient of Malaysian semis on account of a free-trade agreement between the two countries.
Export of billet during the first seven months of this year almost doubled, by registering a 91.7% increase to 957,801 tonnes, according to Malaysia's Department of Statistics. Slab exports during January-July also rose nearly 400% to 1.326 million tonnes. Turkey took in 59.3% of total Malaysian billet exports and 74% of Malaysian slab exports.
The slowdown in the domestic rebar market and excess steelmaking capacity in Malaysia are the main reasons for the increased exports, a Malaysian mill manager says. There is no domestic shortage of semis in the country, he adds.
Malaysia's capacity of semis and hot rolled long products is greater than demand, another Malaysian source says. He hears, though, that slab exports will drop once hot rolled coil production commences in Malaysia. He has also hears of Malaysian induction and electric arc furnace mills starting to import blast furnace billet from Indonesia because it is cheaper. These are on-off bookings of a 20,000-tonne cargo.
Malaysian billet is currently offered at $470/tonne fob and freight from Malaysia is around $40/t, a regional trader says. Imports of other Asian origin billet such as Indonesian or Chinese billet need to pay an import duty into Turkey unlike Malaysian billet, he adds.
Source:Kallanish
