In the past week, while no change has been observed in the general situation of the local Turkish merchant bar market, producers have been trying to avoid decreasing their prices on the export side. With low demand dominating the local market in recent weeks, a similar trend has now started to be seen on the export side as well.
As the general weak demand situation continues in the local Turkish market, slight changes in prices have been observed in the past week due to the fluctuations in the Turkish lira-US dollar exchange rate. While local merchant bar offers have been at TRY 740-810/mt ($483-529/mt) ex-works, excluding VAT, differences continue to be seen between prices in the various regions, and also between list and sales prices. Additionally, Turkish merchant bar producers' export offers have been in the range of $480-510/mt FOB. Due to weak finished steel sales activity, long product producers have also registered a slowdown in purchase activity as regards scrap and billet. These producers think that the partial softening in scrap prices may also trigger a weakening of prices on the semi-finished side. If this happens, a softening may likewise be observed in merchant bar prices. Turkish merchant bar producers are still offering material for mid/late July shipment.
Meanwhile, end-user demand is still weak in the European construction sector, which consumes more merchant bar than any other long steel product. In addition, due to the softening in prices of scrap and other long products, although producers would like to increase their merchant bar prices, they are experiencing difficulty in doing so. Differing levels in list and sales prices are still observed in the European merchant bar markets (just like in Europe's rebar markets) depending on customer, tonnage and payment terms.