Indian mills have not been active in offering to Asia this week, instead they have sold some volumes to Europe and Turkey amid high demand because of shortages after Russia's invasion of Ukraine and the halting of supplies from Ukraine and the sanctions on Russia. Prices have increased significantly, in line with expectations.
A contract for 20,000 mt of ex-India SAE1006 HRC 2 mm has been signed to Turkey at $990/mt CFR this week. Indian sellers have not been actively offering to Turkey since last week amid limited allocation and market uncertainty. The previous sales for ex-China HRC were reported to Turkey at $940-960/mt CFR earlier this week. With the current constantly increasing local prices in Turkey, import prices, specifically from India and China, still have a good bit of space to increase further. “Now they [Chinese suppliers] are going to offer $965/mt CFR for SS400 and $1000/mt CFR+ for SAE1006,” a source said.
In addition, contracts for ex-India coils have been done to Europe. In particular, by Wednesday a contract for 5,000-10,000 mt of SAE1006 HRC was done at $1,050-1,060/mt CFR to Europe. But by the end of this week a sale for ex-India material has already been done at $1,115/mt CFR, SteelOrbis has confirmed. In total, India has sold around 15,000-20,000 mt of HRC to Europe this week.
The lack of large volumes in the ex-India HRC deals reflect the still limited allocation that Indian mills have for April shipment and beyond.
The SteelOrbis reference price for ex-India HRC has surged to $920-1,030/mt FOB, versus $860-870/mt FOB last week. The price range is wide and it does not now include tradable levels to Asia or the Middle East, as no deals were done to this destinations. The market conditions are extraordinary, which explains the surge in the reference price this week.
