Market sources state that Turkish mills' local offers for prime quality 304/2B stainless steel cold rolled coil (CRC) of 2.0 mm thickness for January production have remained unchanged over the past week at the range of $2,700-2,750/mt ex-works, for January shipments. In the given period, Turkish traders' local stainless steel offers in the spot market have also remained stable at $2,750-2,800/mt ex-warehouse. According to market sources, the slack demand in the Turkish domestic stainless steel market has been caused by the traders' unwillingness to get into debt before the New Year, while they postpone their purchases fluctuating nickel prices.
On the other hand, according to market sources, offers from Turkey to the export markets for the same stainless product are still in the range of of $2,500-2,550/mt ex-works.
Additionally, Chinese and Taiwanese offers to Turkey for the same stainless product have declined by $100/mt on the upper end since last week to $2,400-2,550/mt CIF.
The cash and settlement nickel price at the London Metal Exchange (LME) has increased by $230/mt since December 18, closing the day at $15,275/mt on December 24. After, Indonesia's, one of the world's biggest suppliers of nickel, ban of all mineral ore exports including the main raw materials of stainless steel, market players believe there might be tightness in nickel supply in 2015, impacting on stainless steel prices negatively.
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