The Italian flat steel market has trended down slightly in the past week trend, while the slow erosion of prices seems to affect mostly hot dip galvanized, and less hot rolled and cold rolled coils, due to the strong competition between producers of HDG.
At present, in the Italian domestic market producers' base prices are at around €470-480/mt ($600-613/mt) for hot rolled coils (HRC), €550-555/mt ($702-709/mt) for cold rolled coils (CRC) and €525-535/mt ($670-683/mt) for hot dip galvanized (HDG) coils, all ex-works.
Market players continue to complain about the lack of demand and the scarcity and discontinuity of orders, the lack of long-term planning and political and economic instability. For the moment, there are no signs of improvement and local operators continue to maintain a wait-and-see stance.
€1 = $1.277