Russia’s domestic flats prices have surged over the past two weeks, reflecting the continuing global uptrend and also resulting from the gradual seasonal improvement of demand. In addition, the Russian mills have been able to sell hot rolled coil (HRC) abroad with significant price rises, thus generating additional increases for local buyers.
As a result, the local HR sheet prices have increased by $60-72/mt (RUB 6,000-7,000/mt) over the mentioned period, while CR sheet offers have surged by $48-75/mt (RUB 5,000-7,500/mt) depending on the mill. It is worth mentioning that the producers mainly intend to increase their domestic prices further and revert to the current offers as intermediate prices. Still, domestic demand is not yet so solid and business activity is not yet overheated. “There is some seasonal improvement of trading certainly, but at the same time it is being counteracted by some consuming projects being suspended due to the high market prices,” a producer told SteelOrbis.
In the meantime, HRC exports continue to boom and provide great support for the Russian mills. As reported yesterday, Severstal has managed to sell 5,000-7,000 mt of HRC for June rolling to Europe at $970-975/mt FOB, versus $950-960/mt FOB achieved in the previous deals. The other two mills prefer to watch market developments and are not in a rush to announce firm offers for June. Reportedly, bids from Turkey have hit $920/mt CFR, with freight estimated at $25-30/mt. One of the mills is considering announcing $920/mt FOB shortly. Last week, the workable level for ex-Russia HRC was at $890-900/mt FOB.
Overall the CIS-based mills are taking it easy with exports, given that prices have been rising every day. “For now, it is hard to understand which levels will be considered crazy in two weeks and which will be normal, and so we are not rushing sales,” a producer told SteelOrbis.
Local flats offers for May production, CPT
|
Price change (26.03.2021) |
|||
HR sheets |
RUB/mt |
$/mt |
RUB/mt |
$/mt |
NLMK |
76,000 |
829 |
+7,000 |
+71 |
MMK |
80,000 |
872 |
+7,000 |
+71 |
Severstal |
80,000 |
872 |
+6,000 |
+60 |
CR sheets |
|
|
|
|
NLMK |
95,000 |
1,036 |
+7,500 |
+75 |
MMK |
90,000 |
982 |
+5,000 |
+49 |
Severstal |
95,000 |
1,036 |
+5,000 |
+48 |
Local prices in RUB include 20 percent VAT, while prices in US dollars do not.
$1 = RUB 76.41
