While domestic demand for flats in Turkey remains largely insufficient and exports are still scarce, local hot rolled coil (HRC) producers have lowered their prices once again.
According to sources, $880-890/mt ex-works levels are nowadays considered workable for HRC in Turkey, down from $900-920/mt ex-works in the official offers seen during the past week. Some mills are still holding on to $900/mt ex-works officially, but most of the large buyers believe the market will weaken further by mid-October. “We feel the market is heading towards $850-860/mt ex-works, so there is no need to rush to restock now,” an HRC buyer told SteelOrbis. As regards exports, current HRC offers are reported in a rather wide range of $890-920/mt FOB, depending on the supplier and the tonnage.
On the import side, one of the Russian mills closed its October production sales at $880/mt CFR a few weeks ago, while another one seems to have no allocation left for Turkey since it had sold large volumes to Asia previously, as SteelOrbis reported. Ex-Ukraine HRC offers have decreased by around $30/mt since early last week in sales of a total of 20,000 mt of small coils at $830/mt CFR.