Prices in the European flat steel market have continued to move down due to seasonally low demand from consuming sectors. Both local producers and foreign dealers have been cutting their prices to European flat steel market, aiming to attract more orders in the market which is characterized by limited demand. On the other hand buyers believe the declining trend of flat steel prices would continue and so they are currently reluctant to conclude new deals. Buyers state that the declines have been recorded particularly in Chinese flat steel products, while Chinese dealers have continuously lowered their prices below the ruling price levels. Market sources also report that both local and foreign flat steel offers in the European market have been impacted by the low-priced Chinese offers, moving down accordingly.
Over the past two weeks, hot rolled coil (HRC) offers in the local European market have decreased by €10/mt ($11/mt) on the upper end to €370-390/mt ($400-421/mt), cold rolled coil (CRC) offers have declined by €10/mt ($11/mt) on the upper end and by €20/mt ($22/mt) on the lower end to €435-470/mt ($470-508/mt) and hot dip galvanized (HDG) coil offers in northern and southern Europe have declined by €10/mt ($11/mt) to €460-480/mt ($497-518/mt), while HDG coil offers in southern Europe have declined by €20/mt ($22/mt) on the lower end to €410-450/mt ($443-486/mt), all ex-works. Meanwhile, import HRC offers to Europe from sources such as China, India, the CIS, Turkey and Iran have declined by €25/mt ($27/mt) on the lower end and by €15/mt ($16/mt) on the upper end over the past two weeks to €325-355/mt ($351-383/mt) CIF, while CRC offers from the same sources to Europe have declined by €15/mt ($16/mt) on the lower end and by €10/mt ($11/mt) on the upper end over the same period in the range of €410-445/mt ($443-481/mt) CIF.
€1 = $1.08