Over the week, the domestic HRC offers in Turkey have weakened slightly as the mills decided to be more flexible in negotiations with the large buyers, i.e. re-rollers and pipe makers. As a result, $435-440/mt ex-works is available in the market now, some sellers are ready to discuss $425-430/mt ex-works, as SteelOrbis reported earlier. Despite that no sizable deals have been reported in the Turkish local market, by the end of the week, the mills have started to voice intentions to increase their offers shortly, bringing some mixed feelings to the market. “Maybe this is because scrap is firm or maybe because it seems this time there will be no cheap slabs for purchase,” a trader said.
Limited number of the import offers might be another reason for upward moods. Ukraine’s Metinvest, who was testing the market with $420-430/mt CFR offers depending on the coil weight, has decided to return to negotiations next week. Bids were reported by at least $10/mt lower than the offers, SteelOrbis has learned. Russia’s MMK is out of the market and might skip offering for August production, while offers from NLMK, according to sources, are at around $430/mt CFR, almost in line with mill’s deals closed in the previous round. In addition, Asian suppliers are busy with the sales within their region and are not expected to offer to Turkey anytime soon.
Despite that the Turkish mills’ positions might be overall supported by less aggressive imports, the producers are still under pressure of challenging exports. While the number of orders from the EU is low and bids are at $405-410/mt FOB, the official offers from the mills earlier this week were starting with $440/mt FOB. However, $415/mt FOB was considered possible by some mills at buyers’ firm bid. By the end of the week one of producers, according to sources, had given in to buyers’ pressure and managed to sell up to 20,000 mt of HRC to South Africa at around $410-415/mt FOB. Earlier this week a $445/mt CFR sale to China was discussed as closed by a Turkish mill, but all three producers denied it was done.
