Coming up to the end of the current week, demand for finished steel in and around the Middle East region remains steady. Despite this situation, the indications seen last week of a slight decrease in scrap and billet prices, which had been on a strong uptrend for a long time, have this week entered a more definite downward trend.
Billet offers from both producers and traders in the CIS countries have shown decreases of $10-15/mt compared to the beginning of the week, while prices in the Turkish domestic market have dropped by $20/mt over the same period. The offer level of $392/mt + VAT given by a domestic billet producer has gained acceptance, with 28,000 mt of sales concluded. Demand for billet, which has been at high price levels in recent days, has lacked strength due to the weak end-user activity in the Turkish domestic rebar market.
The Turkish billet producers' export activity has remained weak, particularly as the CIS billet price remains at lower levels compared to the Turkish billet price and also due to the new price lists which were expected in the Egyptian market at the end of April. Generally, the demand for billet in the billet and rebar importer countries has also been at low levels due to slow end-user demand.
Meanwhile, the long-standing resistance of billet prices has at last been broken, due to the slide in rebar prices caused by weak end-user demand. In addition, the lower-than-expected price in a scrap booking completed this week has surprised players in the Turkish market. However, this booking for a single cargo cannot be interpreted as a sign of a general slight decrease in prices. Nevertheless, following the decreases observed in market prices for semi-finished and finished steel, the scrap booking in question may be seen to indicate a general trend in raw materials if followed by bookings at similar levels.