Indian steel producers have been faced with lower local consumption this year and as a result increased their exports in the April-November period. The situation in November remained tough for steelmakers as demand in India was falling at a faster rate, but demand from such countries like Vietnam and the decline of inventories have contributed to an improvement in mills’ positions in December. Expectations for January are also mostly positive.
India’s steel exports in November 2019 were recorded at 867,000 mt and, though declining by 8.8 percent on month-on-month basis, the year-on-year growth was 79.9 percent, according to data sourced from the Ministry of Steel. The ministry’s report indicated that this was higher than total steel imports of 438,000 mt in the same month, making the country a net exporter of steel for the month.
“India was a net exporter of steel during both November 2019 and April-November 2019,” the ministry stated. Total steel exports in the April-November period this year amounted to 5.75 million mt, registering a growth of 33.5 percent year on year. Total imports of steel in the given period was 5.1 million mt, a decline of 5.3 percent from the corresponding period of the previous year.
Indian mills managed to sharply increase exports to Vietnam, with shipments reaching 1.682 million mt of HRC in the April-November period this year. In November, Vietnam’s share in India’s steel exports was 34.8 percent, against just 11.7 percent in the same month last year. The second and third placed in the list of top sales destinations for Indian steel were Belgium and the UAE in November, with an 8.6 percent share each. “During April-November 2019, exports of Indian steel witnessed an increase for Vietnam, Nepal, Italy, the UAE, Taiwan, Sri Lanka, etc.,” the ministry said.
The ministry data showed that Indian steel consumption in November registered a fall of 13.3 percent month on month to 7.411 million mt. However, in the April-November period, it still posted a 3.6 percent increase.
Lower local steel demand led not only to much higher exports, but mills were cutting production as well. Indian finished steel production lost 5.4 percent month on month to 7.801 million mt in November. At the same time, in the April-November period, production was marginally up by 1.9 percent compared to the corresponding period of the previous year. The ministry in its report noted that finished steel inventories of all domestic steel producers as of the end of November 2019 totaled 13.21 million mt, noting that the figure “had declined marginally since August 2019”, but no figure for the corresponding time of the previous year was provided by the government.