On April 25, Shanghai-based Chinese steel giant Baoshan Iron and Steel Co. Ltd (Baosteel) issued its financial results for the first quarter of this year, indicating a net profit of RMB 1.628 billion ($262 million), up 33.3 percent on year-on-year basis. Meanwhile, the company achieved a total operating revenue of RMB 46.436 billion ($7.5 billion) in the given quarter, down 2.1 percent compared to the first quarter of 2012.
In the first quarter this year, Baosteel produced 5.541 million mt of pig iron, 5.799 million mt of crude steel and 5.458 million mt of finished steel.
The company stated that the general steel market still showed no obvious improvement in the first quarter despite the favorable development of the Chinese economy amid the slow recovery of the global economy. According to Baosteel, Chinese mills have been facing pressure from production costs due to the increase in prices of raw materials, such as iron ore, metallurgical coke and scrap, while it is still difficult for mills' profit margins to improve due to the instability of downstream demand.