Eurometal rings alarm bells for global steel industry

Tuesday, 25 May 2010 17:09:49 (GMT+2)

In a new report, Eurometal (European Steel and Metals Distributors' Association) has underlined that the main problem plaguing the global steel sector is the imbalance between output and consumption.

During the first four months 2010, global steel output increased by 32 percent year on year, while global steel demand rose by 11 percent. The situation in the NAFTA area and in Europe is quite alarming: on year-on-year basis, NAFTA posted a gap of 35 percentage points (+59 percent for production, +24 percent for consumption), while Europe saw a gap of 30 percentage points (+44 percent for production, +14 percent for consumption). China registered a gap of 18 percentage points (+25 percent for production, +7 percent for consumption), the gap in Latin America was 13 percentage points (+33 percent for production, +20 percent for consumption), CIS countries registered a gap of 11 percentage points (+22 percent for production, +11 percent for consumption) while the Middle East posted a gap of 3 percentage points (+13 percent for production, +10 percent for consumption),

According to Eurometal, if the strong increase rate in production continues, there is an evident risk that steel supply will outstrip steel demand during 2010, with consequent disruptive impacts on steel trade flows and steel pricing.

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