This week, although the general outlook for the Turkish flat steel market has remained weak due to sluggish demand and ongoing economic pressures on both buyers and sellers, Turkish flat steel traders have slightly increased their cold rolled sheet (CRS) prices while keeping their hot rolled sheet (HRS) prices unchanged, as compared with the previous week. According to market participants, slightly improved demand, particularly in the CRS segment, has encouraged small and medium-sized traders with more aggressive pricing strategies to raise their offers back to previous levels. However, as overall trade remains slow, a few traders continue to offer lower prices to attract serious buyers. Meanwhile, a slight upward movement in scrap prices and the stability of HRC mills’ prices have reduced the scope for discounts in the market. Despite this mild improvement, market participants believe that persistently weak local demand will likely keep prices mostly stable in the near term.
In this context, this week’s hot rolled sheet prices have remained stable within the range of $570-590/mt ex-warehouse. Larger traders have maintained their offers at the upper end of the range, while medium-sized and smaller traders have positioned their offers toward the lower end.
In contrast, cold rolled sheet offers have increased slightly over the past week to $650-700/mt ex-warehouse, up from $640-700/mt ex-warehouse previously. However, according to sources, a few traders still offer lower levels at around $645-650/mt ex-warehouse, particularly to serious buyers securing larger tonnages.