Since negative factors have been continuing for months and making the flats market outlook gloomy, many Romania-based retail traders have chosen to remain stable in their prices this week whereas others decided to trend down the prices in order to sell aggressively. On the other hand, Romania’s sole local flat steel producer is trying to increase its hot rolled coil (HRC) prices while the rest of the flat products market maintains previous price positions. Besides that, this week's import offers have been nonexistent because there are sufficient stocks and no need for imports due to a lack of demand.
The domestic steel producer in Romania is trying to increase prices by €50/mt to €820-870/mt ex-works for HRC for October production while for the cold rolled coil (CRC) prices are the same as last week at €930/mt ex-works. Additionally, the mill's domestic market prices for HDG and PPGI in the category of coated steel have remained at €1,010/mt ex-works and €1,250/mt ex-works, respectively, unchanged from previous weeks.
“Due to ongoing global inflation, rising cost prices, and most crucially a lack of demand, the market is being pulled in a negative direction, so our price increase has stopped and we are trying to hold this price range. However, for no apparent reason, some other Romanian retail traders have opted to sell vigorously.” a trader told SteelOrbis.
Currently, traders' prices for hot rolled sheets (HRS) have remained constant at €875-1,040/mt ex-warehouse. Similarly, the feasible price for cold rolled sheets (CRS) have stayed the same as the previous week at €1,045-1,090/mt ex-warehouse. While some other aggressive traders are trying to sell rashly at €845/mt ex-warehouse for HRS and €935/mt ex-warehouse for the CRS which is not workable at this market level.