Medium-sized mills increase plate supply remarkably

SteelOrbis Shanghai Over the past week, Chinese medium plate prices moved up slightly, with a remarkable increase in supply from medium-sized mills, thus narrowing the supply gap with products from leading mills. The northern region has continued to maintain its flat trading performance, with a basically smooth sales trend prevailing in other regions. On September 20, the average price of 16mm Q235 B plate in Shanghai, Tianjin and Lecong increased RMB 7/mt ($1) week on week to RMB 3,670/mt ($463), while that of 16 mm Q345 B plate increased RMB 15/mt ($2) to RMB 3,800/mt ($479). According to the price trend analysis for the whole week, the market price increase began to slow down in comparison with the previous week. Nevertheless, there were no big fluctuations in prices. As some traders recently expressed it, the bearish commercial activity on high-price supply led to the price fluctuation in the middle of the past week. However, the prices saw a quick rebound after the slight decrease due to the insufficient supply from the leading steel mills and also due to the price increase for product supply from the medium-sized mills. The price hike by the mills also gave a boost to the market. For example, in Lecong and other regions, after the local leading mills raised the ex-factory prices, the market prices showed a quick reaction on the same day. However, the upward momentum in the market is weakening. As we have learned from several major traders, the supply arrival from the leading mills in the near future will alleviate the shortage of products from those mills. Both traders and the leading mills are quite cautious about the market prices. Most of them think that the market will become stable in the short term. Regarding imports and exports, Japanese steel suppliers have reached an agreement with Chinese shipbuilding companies on export prices of $660/mt FOB for October. With the shortage of Asian shipbuilding plate, the export prices are expected to exceed $660/mt FOB for next month. China Wuhan Iron and Steel Group reduced the domestic prices of shipbuilding plate for October by RMB 500/mt However, Japanese mills insist on keeping their shipbuilding plate export prices to China high, claiming that their +4000 mm wide products are superior to those of Wuhan's 2,500 mm wide products.. In addition, Baosteel has also hiked its shipbuilding prices by RMB 100/mt for October. It is said that the market is experiencing a shortage of shipbuilding plate supply from Baosteel, Anshan New Steel, and Wuyang Steel at present. The future market trend will mainly see stable movement. It is expected that high-price supply will decline a little following the product arrivals from the leading mills.