Hot rolled coils (HRC) prices are looking strong in the European market, thanks to high production costs, increasing import offers, and good end-user demand in most sectors, excluding automotive where consumption has remained lower than expected. European mills have been targeting higher prices in the past few weeks and, while transaction prices have remained stable in northern Europe in the past week, they have kept increasing in the Italian market, which is traditionally more exposed to import offers.
Transaction prices have trended sideways in northern Europe, i.e., at €940-970/mt ex-works, although mills' offers have reached around €1,000/mt ex-works and above.
Meanwhile, workable prices are now at about €870-900/mt ex-works in the Italian market, up €30/mt on average compared to last week. Local mills' offers have reached a maximum of €940/mt ex-works, according to sources. "Eventually, they would like to go back to the €1,000/mt level that was last seen in September, and this may happen sooner than later," one source commented.
Import offers have kept increasing in the past few weeks, approaching the €900/mt CFR Italy level, and even surpassing it in some cases. More specifically, ex-Indonesia offers are at $960-965/mt (€855-849/mt) CFR, while ex-Egypt offers are at $1,020/mt (€897/mt) CFR. Turkey is offering at $1,020-1,030/mt (€897-906/mt) CFR, although the higher end of the range is considered too high for the moment by European buyers. 25,000-30,000 mt from Vietnam were sold to Italy at $945/mt (€831/mt) CFR recently, and now ex-Vietnam offers are at €850-860/mt CFR, while the latest deal for ex-India material was closed last week at $930-935/t (€818-823/mt) CFR southern Europe. Meanwhile, Russian producer Severstal has announced April offers to northern Europe at $1,000/mt FOB, duty excluded, which is around €905/mt CFR northern EU, duty paid.
$1 = €088