In August, China’s outputs of pig iron, crude steel and finished steel totaled 74.62 million mt, 86.41 million mt and 116.52 million mt, indicating decline of 3.84 percent, 4.83 percent and 0.01 percent, respectively, month on month, as announced by China's National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) on September 15. However, crude steel production in August compared to the same month last year was still 3.2 percent higher, while pig iron – 4.8 percent higher, finished steel –as much as 11.4 percent above August 2022.
The average steel prices moved down in the first half of the given month amid the slack demand in the traditional offseason, which was also negatively affected by the heavy rainfalls caused by several typhoons. In the latter period of August, steel prices fluctuated within a limited range amid the better market situation and the improved sentiments among market players, which was bolstered by Chinese policymakers’ issuance of stimulus policies. However, as high raw material prices and not much improvement in steel prices in August impacted the steel producers’ margins, overall steel production in the country posted decline. There have been no mandatory production cuts in China in August with the government only called all major mills to keep output at not above last year’s levels.
In the January-August period this year, China’s outputs of pig iron, crude steel and finished steel amounted to 603.59 million mt, 712.93 million mt and 909.2 million mt, increasing by 3.7 percent, 2.6 percent and 6.3 percent, respectively, year on year. This means that in general overall tendency for steel production has not changed with the pace of increase at 2.5 percent in January-July.