Since business activity had been sluggish throughout the month, mainly due to summer vacations, Romanian flat steel traders have failed to maintain prices and have decided to reduce offers over the past week. Meanwhile, Romania's sole flat steel producer, which sees no need for price reductions due to consumers' unwillingness to make orders, has maintained its pricing stable week on week.
“We reduced offerings somewhat, and demand is slightly more than it was 1-2 weeks ago, but it is still below our expectations,” a trader told SteelOrbis.
As a result, in the spot market, traders’ prices for hot rolled sheets (HRS) and cold rolled sheets (CRS) have decreased from the previous week by €5-10/mt to €720-745/mt ex-warehouse and €830-845/mt ex-warehouse, respectively.
On the other hand, the sole domestic producer’s local hot rolled coil (HRC) and cold rolled coil (CRC) prices are stable week on week at €615-620/mt ex-works and €715-720/mt ex-works, respectively. Similarly, the local producer’s domestic offers for HDG and PPGI are unchanged week on week at €785-790/mt ex-works and €1,065-1,070/mt ex-works, respectively.
Although Romanian buyers remain not interested in the import segment, according to sources, Ukraine has offered HRS and CRS for €610-615/mt DAP and €700-710/mt DAP, compared to €600/mt DAP and €690-700/mt DAP last week, respectively. Also, this week, Turkish mills continued to offer HRC prices of $575-590/mt FOB, with freight costs of roughly €25/mt, arriving in Romania at around €545-555/mt CFR.
