For the week ended April 7, US West coast scrap exporters were heard providing limited volumes on offer as Taiwanese buyers showed limited buying interest and the US domestic market settled.
The few offers for HMS I/II 80:20 were heard at $255-257/mt CFR Taiwan while buyers were bidding $245-250/mt CFR Taiwan. US exporters were hesitant to provide offers at prices lower than $255/mt CFR Taiwan for HMS I/II 80:20 due to the rebound in export scrap prices in the East coast, dealer resistance through the domestic April buy-cycle that dampened the expected price decline on shredded, and comparatively higher Japanese H2 scrap export prices, which declined during the April Tetsugen scrap auction. But compared to the ex-US scrap offers, the H2 offers were higher than the normal variance. US origin containerized HMS I/II 80:20 H2 traditionally trades only slightly lower than Japanese origin H2.
The H2 grade export offer limited US offers as prices for Japanese H2 were heard at $270-275/mt CFR Taiwan and $280-283/mt CFR Vietnam, potentially giving US exporters an opportunity to increase prices in upcoming tenders.
According to sources close to SteelOrbis, no recent scrap deals have been heard for Japanese H2 for export. Taiwanese mills have avoided purchasing Japanese H2 scrap on the basis of high cost as well as H2 seller’s preference to sell to Japanese mills due to their higher domestic prices even after recent downward adjustments on scrap purchase prices by mills.
Taiwanese mills announced decreases on scrap prices for the last two weeks and the present import bids for US origin HMS I/II 80:20 are heard at $240-247/mt CFR Taiwan. According to a source, “Given the downward trend in global scrap prices, deals between $247-252/mt CFR Taiwan may be in the market this week.”