Local Indian cold rolled coil (CRC) trade prices have softened marginally due to the expectations and further announcements of base price cuts by mills, but the declines have been limited as major consumers in the automobile and consumer durable industries have resumed strong restocking as they prepare to step up output to meet demand during the festival period ahead, SteeOrbis learned from trade and industry circles on Monday, September 5.
Indian benchmark 0.9 mm CRC trade prices have edged down INR 200/mt ($3/mt) to INR 66,300/mt ($831/mt) ex-Mumbai and are similarly down INR 200/mt ($3/mt) to INR 66,600/mt ($835/mt) ex-Chennai in the south.
Despite clear signals that mills have started reducing September base prices starting on Monday, heavy bookings have been reported both by trade channels and mills as leading auto majors have concluded large-volume spot deals expecting to ramp up outputs and build on robust sales achieved in August and during the expected festival sales of the October-November period, the sources said.
Some market intermediaries had claimed that discounted sales seen by re-rolling mills earlier in the week had all been pulled back as the market was facing a tightening of supplies and this limited the trade price fall despite producers indicating lower base prices.
In fact, a Mumbai-based steel distributor maintained that, if the current pace of bookings is sustained for a few weeks, trade prices could hold at a premium to mills’ base prices, a situation not seen in the past several years. New base CRC prices from mills for September have been announced at INR 64,000-65,000/mt ($802-814/mt).
$1 = INR 79.80