Posted on 03 Mar 2025
The delay in settling an antidumping claim against coated steel imports from China and South Korea has prompted the Vietnam Steel Association (VSA) to urge the Ministry of Industry and Trade (MOIT) to hasten its decision, warning that increasing volumes of low-priced Chinese coated coils are placing significant pressure on domestic manufacturers. The VSA is frustrated because another AD claim against hot rolled coil (HRC) imports from China and India lodged later has now been decided.
"Since antidumping measures against Chinese coated steel expired in May 2022, imports from China have surged, accounting for 64-67% of the total imported steel during the 2022-23 period," VSA chairman Nghiem Xuan Da complained. "This trend continues to undermine Vietnam's domestic steel industry and requires urgent intervention," local media Tuoi Tre News quotes Da as saying.
At issue is the petition filed early last year by five Vietnamese steelmakers – Hoa Sen Group, Nam Kim Steel, Southern Steel Sheet, Ton Dong A Corporation and China Steel & Nippon Steel Vietnam – claiming that imports of common carbon and alloy coated steel from China and South Korea had caused them "significant injury". The five petitioners asked the government to impose dumping margins of 69.23% on imports of the coated coils from China, and 3.41% on those from South Korea.
In June, Vietnam's Trade Remedies Authority under the MOIT had issued a notice confirming that the petition lodged by the five mills was "complete and valid," as Mysteel Global reported. The investigation was to examine over 40 different types of flat-rolled carbon steel products in both coil and non-coil forms, containing less than 0.6% carbon by weight and coated or plated with anti-corrosive metals (galvanized).
The VSA is frustrated because the Trade Remedies Authority has yet to issue a ruling regarding the five mills' claim against coated sheet and yet early last week, on February 21, the authority had imposed preliminary anti-dumping (AD) duties of between 19.38% and 27.83% on China-origin carbon steel that will come into force on March 7 and remain in place for 120 days, as reported.
That probe had been initiated on July 29 last year – nearly two months after that launched into coated sheet – and yet the ruling was made earlier, a process that a Ho Chi Minh steel industry source criticized as "unreasonable and illogical," according to Tuoi Tre News.
"HRC – the primary raw material for coated steel – is now protected (while) the coated steel sector remains vulnerable to a persistent influx of cheap imports," the steel source said. "As a result, domestic HRC prices have risen due to anti-dumping duties, increasing production costs for coated steel manufacturers."
Indeed, Vietnam News quotes a report from Hanoi-based VPBank Securities as pointing out that companies reliant on imported HRC such as Hoa Sen Group and Nam Kim Steel will face negative impacts as a result of the AD penalty being imposed. The coated coil makers have mitigated their risks by diversifying import sources, and their Q4 financial reports show higher inventory values, indicating stockpiling before the AD duty announcement, the report notes.
"Consequently, the short-term impact on the two producers is expected to be minimal, but in the long term, they will need to use domestic HRC or higher-priced imports from other sources," it observed.
Source:Mysteel Global
