The Vietnamese Ministry of Finance has ordered local steel mills to submit reports on their operational and production costs as the government tries to bring domestic inflation under control.
Head of the ministry's Price Control Department Mr. Nguyen Tien Thoa has stated that if the committee finds any gross discrepancies between production costs and market prices, an investigation will be launched.
The deadline for the submission of reports has been set as July 20.
Steel prices in Vietnam have been rising over the last two months. Since the beginning of the year domestic steel prices have increased by 23 percent.
Chairman of the Vietnam Steel Association (VSA) Mr. Pham Chi Cuong explained the domestic steel price rise as being the result of the high imported ingot steel prices, especially after China upped its export taxes on steel ingot exports from 10 percent to 15 percent as of June 1.
However, market experts believe that Vietnamese steel mills are still using cheaper ingots imported before the change in China's tax policy though they cite the Chinese tax increase as an excuse to increase their selling prices.