Business conditions remain favorable for Russia’s flats producers in terms of exports, allowing them to further increase their offer and deal prices. The key supports are coming from the European and Turkish markets, where the lack of domestic allocations has once again fueled local price increases this week. Positive exports, in their turn, are used by Russian mills as one of the leverages to increase their local prices in Russia.
Russia’s Severstal continues to enjoy lively demand coming from Europe, with bids and sales prices rising day by day. In such a situation, the supplier is not rushing its sales, preferring to sell in small lots. Last week, the deal prices at $970-975/mt FOB Baltic Sea were followed by around 10,000 mt sales at $1,000-1,030/mt FOB and the most recent deals for small batches were sold at $1,045/mt FOB, SteelOrbis has learned. The producer is in the market to sell for June production. The outlook for Severstal’s sales is positive, especially taking into account the most recent price increase in Europe by ArcelorMittal.
Other Russia-based HRC producers have also increased their export prices, supported by favorable business conditions, in the Turkish market specifically. MMK has set its offer for June production at $960/mt CFR Turkey, while earlier the mill considered offering at $945-950/mt CFR. The prices from NLMK have been reported by buyers at $960-970/mt CFR, up by around $30-35/mt from the previous price ideas, SteelOrbis understands. Moreover, according to sources, the producer has already managed to sell some lots at $960-965/mt CFR. The freight rates to Turkey are mainly estimated at $25/mt on average.
Increasing export prices, coupled with the seasonal demand improvement and low stocks, have resulted in the rise of domestic flats offers in Russia. MMK has increased sheet prices since earlier this week, while Severstal has announced a price rise in the cold rolled segment and plans to have a new offer for hot rolled next week.
Local flats offers for May production, CPT
|
RUB/mt |
$/mt |
Price change (06.04.2021) |
||
|
RUB/mt |
$/mt |
|||
|
HR sheets |
||||
|
MMK |
83,000 |
896 |
+3,000 |
+24 |
|
Severstal |
80,000 |
864 |
0 |
-8 |
|
CR sheets |
||||
|
MMK |
98,000 |
1,058 |
+8,000 |
+76 |
|
Severstal |
100,000 |
1,080 |
+5,000 |
+44 |
Local prices in RUB include 20 percent VAT, while prices in US dollars do not.
$1 = RUB 77.19