Speaking at the SteelOrbis 2018 Spring Conference & 78th IREPAS Meeting held in Warsaw on May 6-8, Wilhelm Alff from Duferco, the chairman of the traders committee, said that the main topics discussed during the traders committee meeting were the tariffs in the US and the safeguard investigations launched in the EU and also lately in Turkey. He said he thinks that the EU will wait until the final announcement from the US to conclude its own investigation.
The traders committee chairman stated that, despite the 25 percent duty on imports, the US has to import rebar as they are not self-sufficient, though he also pointed out that Turkey, the biggest rebar exporter to the US, is unlikely to gain an exemption from the tariffs.
Regarding the outlook for Chinese exports, Mr. Alff said that they will continue to close down unproductive and illegal plants and they will shift production to electric arc furnaces. He explained that the EAF capacity they are going to build is about 40-50 million mt, while they will be reducing other capacity at the same time at a very similar rate. However, there will be a surplus of 20 million mt, which, while it might sound a lot for the EU, for example, is relatively small for China in terms of overall demand. The traders committee chairman said he thinks that the Chinese have learnt their lesson already, i.e., that the risk of antidumping duty is always there. He said that the Chinese are building new plants for their own consumption, adding that they will not be absolutely absent from the export scene but their contribution will be modest.
