Indian local cold rolled coil (CRC) prices remained unchanged during the past week at INR 46,000/mt ($624/mt) ex-works amid limited trading despite all indications pointing towards a base price increase next month by producers, and market conditions giving mixed signals on short term outlook, traders said on Monday, September 28.
According to market intermediaries and producers, the negatives of government ruling out any tax cuts on automobile deepened sentiments among buyers, on the other side, healthy sales reported by the industry and optimism over it recovering further during festival months of October-November, resulted in mixed signals from key user industry.
“In case of CRC, unlike other flat product segments, short term outlook is very uncertain. Key buyers are unlikely to rush to increase output at auto production lines as it would have been in case of government tax cuts. It is estimated that current output levels could well take care of higher festive season sales. This will mean that CRC bookings can remain sluggish over the next few months and risks further downside if producers increase base price to maintain spreads with rising hot rolled coil (HRC) prices,” a marketing official with a private steel mill said.
$1= INR 73.66