Russia-based Severstal, one of the main CIS-based flats suppliers, has already managed to close its February production export sales and has refreshed its domestic offers for the same month. In addition, the mill has started its March export sales and has already managed to trade considerable volumes due to more favorable market fundamentals in the EU.
Severstal has sold a total of around 60,000-70,000 of HRC for February production for export, almost exclusively to the European market. The initial pricing was set at $890-940/mt FOB depending on the coil weight and some lots were traded at these levels. However, early this month the company had to step back by $30-40/mt, aiming to fill its order books. After the holidays, demand in the EU turned out to be better than expected, so Severstal sold an even bigger volume than was initially planned. For March production, the mill aims to export around 100,000 mt and the starting price for big coils was preliminarily set at $885/mt FOB Baltic Sea. However, the producer has managed to already trade around 40,000 mt for March this week due to increased demand and raised its price to $900/mt FOB.
In the domestic market, Severstal has set its prices at RUB 78,500/mt ($877/mt) CPT for hot-rolled sheets and at RUB 84,000/mt ($938/mt) CPT for cold-rolled sheets. Over the past month, the supplier’s local offers have increased by RUB 1,000-1,500/mt, but have remained almost unchanged in the US dollar basis.
Prices in RUB do not include 20 percent VAT.
$1 = RUB 74.6