Arcelor Brasil to increase long product capacity

The Brazilian division of Arcelor SA said this week that it plans to play a bigger role in the consolidation of the Latin American long product steel sector, by increasing its long product production capacity in the coming years. According to the company's CFO, Leonardo Horta, the company expects to buy two million metric tons of long steel production capacity in Latin America over the next five years. "Arcelor Brasil is a consolidator, and we're very active in analyzing all of the opportunities in Latin America," Mr. Horta said during a conference call to discuss the company's fourth quarter and 2006 earnings. Arcelor Brasil's most recent major consolidation move was its purchase in January 2006 of Laminadora Costarricense and Trefilaria Colima in Costa Rica. These acquisitions added 400,000 metric tons of production capacity. In other news for Arcelor Brasil, the company has started operations at one of its new blast furnaces at its Juiz de Fora minimill in Minas Gerais state, and the second blast furnace at the site is scheduled to start up within the next few days. The blast furnaces will produce 180,000 metric tons per year, and will reduce the plant's dependency on scrap, according to Mr. Horta. Arcelor Brasil is comprised of steelmakers CST, Vega do Sul, and Belgo-Mineira, which controls the Argentine steelmaker Acindar.