Local Indian cold rolled coil (CRC) prices have remained stable amid scarce trade activity and continuing discounted sales by mills.
Sources said that the benchmark 0.9 mm CRC price is stable at INR 62,500/mt ($749/mt) ex-Mumbai and unchanged at INR 63,750/mt ($764/mt) ex-Chennai in the south, but volumes have been available from standalone re-rollers at discounts in the range of INR 1,500-2,000/mt ($18-24/mt) as the market has firmly entered into an over-supply situation.
They said that large automobile companies have been lowering new booking volumes, anticipating sales will soften after most manufacturers have announced price hikes to be effective from January.
“We expect the pressures on prices to be sustained at least until the end of January as new import bookings have eased since arrivals of material against past supply contracts will continue to put some pressure for some more weeks,” a Mumbai-based distributor told SteelOrbis.
“We see prices softening further by another two to three percent before the market stabilizes. But the significant upside potential will continue to remain limited as key user industries are facing headwinds to sales growth in the last quarter of the fiscal year and restocking of raw material will be very cautious,” he added.
$1 = INR 83.40
