During the week ending April 17, hot rolled coil (HRC) prices in the Chinese domestic market have been trending sideways, though with a tiny increase seen for some sizes . Average HRC prices in the main Chinese markets can be viewed in the SteelOrbis price reports section.
At present, traders do not have large inventories and are still making efforts to push up their prices. However, amid lackluster demand, there remains a big gap between market offers and the actual deal prices. On April 17, in the Shanghai market HRC deals were mostly transacted at RMB 4,340/mt ($691/mt), with a few transactions concluded at RMB 4,360/mt ($694/mt). Downstream buyers have recently been cautious, just purchasing enough to meet their requirements.
Following the price announcement made by Baosteel, WISCO has also released its price policy for May, raising its HRC offers by RMB 20-40/mt ($3-6/mt). In addition, it is expected that in the short term production costs will provide increasing support for HRC prices. It is expected that HRC prices in China will continue their sideways trend in the coming week.