Indian hot dip galvanized coil (HDG) exporters have continued to offer discounts of $10-20/mt during the past week to maintain offers at around $830/mt CFR US, but transaction volumes are marginally down as US buyers have become cautious.
"The active buying interest seen earlier in the current month in response to aggressive discounting by local HDG exporters seems to be waning," a Mumbai-based trader said.
"US buyers' appetite for Indian HDG may be down after heavy bookings early in the month. Distributors in the US market may also have become more cautious due to reports indicating that US shipments of HDG have increased 8-10 percent," the trader added.
However, market sources indicate that local exporters are able to maintain aggressive pricing in view of the Indian rupee remaining weaker than INR 63 to the US dollar.
In fact, several traders state that HDG exporters could even increase discounts in the coming week to revive buying interest since the rupee is expected to weaken against the dollar, ensuring higher realizations from HDG exports.
Meanwhile, sources said that in the Gulf Co-operation Council (GCC) markets, trading activity witnessed a slowdown and negligible transactions have been reported as offers remained at $600/mt CFR Gulf.
Sources said that the approach of Ramadan has been leading to a slowdown in trading activity in the Gulf markets as most buyers and end-user importers are awaiting previously-booked shipments and are not inclined to make fresh booking with Ramadan ahead.