In 2024, Turkey remained a large and important destination for square billet exporters globally since Turkish producers continued to use semis as an alternative to scrap imports, aiming to balance out their production costs. Moreover, during the year, the issue of carefully maintaining affordable costs of production became even more crucial in Turkey, considering its lower rebar export volumes due to tough competition with the more competitive DRI-based costs of North African suppliers.
In the January-October period 2024, according to the Turkish customs authorities, Turkey imported 2.8 million mt of square billet, while it is estimated that the tonnage for the full year may reach 3.5-3.6 million mt. However, some market players assume the overall import volume for the full year may be lower than that, but will definitely be above 3.4 million mt since some cargoes may have been postponed until delivery in early January. In 2023, Turkey had imported 3.05 million mt of billet.
Steel billet imports to Turkey in 2023-2024
The origins of billet imports arriving in Turkey changed significantly during the year. In particular, Russian mills lost their dominance in the market, with their presence in the Turkish market decreasing from 1.4 million mt in 2023 to close to 700,000 mt in 2024. Turkey mainly switched to buying small lots from Russia with short lead times, while only a couple of Turkish mills continued buying from a large Russian producer on a regular basis. The main reasons for the fall in billet imports from Russia were the pressure from sanctions and also the competitive pricing from Asia due to the crisis in the Chinese steel market with its low demand and relatively high production volumes, with the price trend in China being followed by mills in the ASEAN region.
Algeria’s billet exports to Turkey declined by over 50 percent in 2024 due to persisting production issues at the DRI module of the leading Algerian exporting mill. These volumes were replaced by Asian mills, in particular by Chinese mills which regained their presence in Turkey with exports of over 0.5 million mt in 2024. In the given year, Malaysia, which is a duty-free origin in Turkey and is important for Turkish long steel exporters in particular, increased its billet sales to Turkey by over 0.5 million mt compared to 2023. Indonesia also took a large share of the import billet market with billet sales of around 340,000 mt to Turkey in 2024. At the same time, GCC-based mills were selling only minor volumes, focusing either on billet sales to the regional market or on DRI/HBI sales. Moreover, Saudi Arabia in 2024 focused on billet purchases from Asia, booking at least 250,000 mt of billet from China.
Import billet structure in Turkey, 2023-2024
In terms of prices, both import billet and scrap were moving down gradually during the year, with 2024 ending at lower price levels compared to the end of the previous year, as shown in the average monthly prices for both products in the graphs below. The lowest deal prices from Asia for billet, particularly from China, were at $460-463/mt CFR, while the bottom scrap price level from the EU during the year was at $330/mt CFR for HMS I/II (80:20).
Turkey’s import billet and scrap prices, 2023-2024
The peaks of Turkey’s import billet activity in 2024, mainly in terms of large volumes from Asia, were observed in the periods when the workable billet prices from abroad were at least $10-15/mt below captive billet production costs in Turkey. In particular, in the second half of the year Indonesian billet was first purchased at slightly above $500/mt CFR and then only below this level, while the workable prices from China stood mostly at $460-480/mt CFR. Malaysian origin billet, being advantageous for Turkish longs exporters, was mainly purchased at above $505-510/mt CFR in 2024, with the latest workable levels in December reported at $485-490/mt CFR.
The outlook for the first quarter of 2025 is rather pessimistic given the number of uncertainties prevailing in the market. In January, import billet prices in Turkey may slide further from the late December levels, but not below the bottom levels in 2024 ($460-463/mt CFR). Later in the quarter, in mid-February, the mood may become slightly positive following the Chinese New Year holiday. However, import billet prices for non-toxic origins are expected to fluctuate within a relatively narrow range, with no dramatic ups or downs.