Indian flat steel export trades have surged during the past week as large steel mills stepped up to aggressively push higher volumes overseas, particularly of hot rolled coil (HRC), to China and Southeast Asia to cope with sustained low domestic demand and rising steel mill inventories, SteelOrbis has been informed. In some deals, a slight price increase has been achieved and the Indian mills have been insisting on higher coil offer prices for December shipment.
Over the past week, Indian mills have managed to sell up to 120,000 mt of HRC abroad. The deal prices have been at $398-400/mt FOB mostly for December shipment, while previous deals were at $395/mt FOB.
One eastern India-based steel mill has concluded a deal for 50,000 mt of HRC for late December delivery to Vietnam at $398-400/mt FOB, which is equivalent to about $422/mt CFR. Previously Vietnamese buyers were focused on purchases of smaller volumes from ports or just limited quantities from mills. Recent offers for ex-India HRC have been heard at $425-430/mt CFR ($400-405/mt FOB).
The sources also said a western India-based large steel mill has reportedly concluded an export contract for end-December loading for 35,000 mt of HRC to China at around $398/mt FOB.
According to sources, trader-exporters have also become active during the past week, but mostly for low-volume contracts with buyers in Indonesia and Malaysia for early January deliveries. The aggregate export volumes booked by these traders was around 35,000 mt at average offers of about $400/mt FOB.
“Large domestic steel mills are being forced to lower conversion to CRC in view of lower domestic demand. As a fallout, most of these mills have become very aggressive in pushing volumes overseas through very competitive offers,” a Mumbai-based trader said.
