The Turkish hot rolled coil (HRC) market has been quiet lately and mills have been aiming to avoid large discounts at least in their domestic sales, given elatively stable scrap and import slab prices. However, demand has been quite poor and the pricing for Turkish HRC is currently considered to be weak. The import offers from China have softened over the past week, but suppliers remain relatively non-aggressive giving the non-VAT trading issue in China.
Despite many rumors about low HRC offers from China to Turkey at $550/mt CFR, the information is not taken seriously by market players since a majority of indications are much higher. In particular, most offers for Q195 HRC of 3 mm and higher are at $570-572/mt CFR for 40,000-50,000 mt and for June shipments. Discounts of a few dollars are considered possible. A week ago, the price levels stood at $580/mt CFR and above. No fresh deals have been reported lately since buyers are quite cautious amid the low demand. Aside from China, there have been offers from Egypt at $620/mt FOB or around $635-640/mt CFR Turkey.
In the domestic market, Turkish producers have been trying to maintain official offers at $620-630/mt ex-works base for end-of-June deliveries, while $610/mt ex-works is considered possible. Moreover, there have been reports about a deal for around 20,000-25,000 mt closed at about $605-607/mt ex-works.
As for exports, the workable level for ex-Turkey HRC, particularly in the EU, is considered to be not higher than $580-590/mt FOB, in line with the massive deals closed in the first half of May, mainly to Italy and Spain. However, most official offers are now at $600/m FOB and slightly above.
