Some developments observed in the international stainless steel market and in trends of raw materials have created expectations that stainless steel prices will move upward. Although nickel prices at the London Metal Exchange (LME) had previously increased as compared to early January, quotations have declined in recent days and are now close to the levels seen at the start of the New Year.
Major Chinese steel stainless producers' list prices have indicated some increases, following European stainless steel mills' hikes of their base prices. Chinese steel giant Baosteel has kept its stainless steel prices unchanged over the past month, while another Chinese steelmaker Taigang has increased its austenitic product prices by $30/mt. In the meantime, Taiwan-based YUSCO has announced increases in both its local and export stainless steel prices.
Meanwhile, import stainless steel offers for Turkey and domestic production stainless steel prices in the local Turkish market have been moving upward, though stainless steel demand in Turkey, which is performing better as compared to late 2013, is not yet ready to absorb these hikes. Far Eastern offers to Turkey for prime quality ready stock 304/2B stainless steel cold rolled coil (CRC) of 2.0 mm thickness are standing in a wide range of $2,250-2,450/mt CIF Istanbul, while European offers for Turkey and Turkish domestic production prices, with the latter on ex-works basis, are about $100-200/mt higher than this range.
Turkey's stainless flat steel imports in 2013 amounted to 474,317mt, increasing by 33.27 percent as compared to the previous year, with 94,430 mt of the total imported from Taiwan which ranked as Turkey's top import source for stainless steel products in the given year.
In the meantime, Finland-based stainless steel producer Outokumpu, which has a announced financial loss for 2013, expects a recovery in stainless steel demand in the first quarter of 2014, while it is reported that China will increase its stainless steel production in 2014.
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