MMK, one of the three key hot rolled coil suppliers in Russia and an important export player in the Black Sea region and Asia, has decided to postpone the restart of its 2500 hot rolling line. While earlier the resumption of operations of the line after a long period of maintenance was scheduled for June, now the producer is planning to restart the mill by the end of July, SteelOrbis has learned.
The 2500 mill, capable of around 3 million mt of HRC production per year, has been under maintenance since around March. Improving the material quality, widening the production range and increasing the coil weight have been the key targets of the modernization of the facility. With the renewed mill 2500 MMK will fully focus on big coil production, while previously this particular facility was producing mainly small coils which were mostly traded abroad. MMK’s big coils weigh up to 30 mt. Some of the mill’s production, once operational, may be sold to some customers within the CIS, SteelOrbis understands. Moreover, the company may win some buyers in the flats re-rolling segment globally, in the MENA region specifically.
Despite the scheduled restart of the 2500 mill in late July, MMK may still have a somewhat limited allocation for August production, market players think. “I don’t think the mill will start at full capacity. This takes time,” a source said. According to sources, MMK plans to export around 100,000 mt of August production HRC, while in the previous round of sales the company was barely active in exports and traded almost all its allocation locally, as reported previously.