The municipal government of Tangshan in China’s Hebei Province has announced that it has decided to implement production restrictions in the range of 20-30 percent on sintering machines of steelmakers until the end of September, effective as of September 4, though blast furnaces have not been affected yet.
These are the first official restrictions reported for September, and it will certainly affect the crude steel output of the city. However, given the absence of restriction announcements for any other provinces, in general Chinese crude steel production will not be impacted much and will stay at high levels. This, together with the still limited improvement in demand, will prevent steel prices from recording significant rises.
At the same time, in the Caofeidian district, non-road mobile machinery is not allowed to use oil-fired engines from 18:00 o’clock to 8:00 o’clock, which will have an impact on harbor dredging in the evening.
Steel futures at Shanghai Futures Exchange have posted small changes, with the mood still being uncertain. Rebar futures prices declined by 0.1 percent today, while HRC prices have increased by 0.2 percent.