Local Indian cold rolled coils (CRC) have emerged as an outlier in the flat steel market with traded prices edging up, but they have remained at a discount to the base prices of mills, SteelOrbis has learned from trade and industry circles.
Following hikes announced last week, base CRC prices moved to INR 77,000-78,000/mt ($1,027-1,040/mt) ex-work for benchmark 0.9 mm gauge or slightly above.
Reacting to the base price changes, the traded price gained INR 3,000/mt ($40/mt) to the range of INR 75,000-76,000/mt ($1,000-1,013/mt) ex-Mumbai, but is still at a discount to mills’ prices, trade sources said.
“Discounted local CRC traded prices are divergent to the overall flat product market and a reflection of the negative outlook for key consuming sectors like home appliances and automobiles. Restocking is uncertain as both these sectors are heavily impacted by the shortage of microchips,” a Mumbai-based trader said.
“There is a significant slowdown of CRC stock movement from mills to the market, in contrast to the HRC market, which seems to have absorbed base price increases and with traded prices almost at par with mills’ rates,” he said.
According to two other traders, there is a lot of supply-side pressure on prices from standalone re-rolling mills, which are pushing volumes in the market rendered surplus as key auto majors have deferred lifting material under long-term supply contracts since production lines are working at lower than capacity, reducing raw material requirements.
$1= INR 75.00