Though sentiment has not been very good in China's import billet market this week and most suppliers have failed to get higher deal prices there, the uptrend has continued in Southeast Asia. Demand has improved after a pause, and as prices in the Philippines had not been able to catch up with Chinese quotations earlier, they had a room to move up.
The SteelOrbis reference price for import billet to Southeast Asia, based mainly on the tradable level to the Philippines, has increased by $10-15/mt over the past week to $645-650/mt CFR.
A total volume of about 20,000-30,000 mt of billet from Russia’s Far East region has been traded to the Philippines at $650/mt CFR this week. In addition, 6,000 mt of ex-Japan billet has changed hands at $645/mt CFR. “Buyers are in negotiations because restocking is needed,” a local source in Manila said. Last week, the tradable price level was at $630-640/mt CFR, according to SteelOrbis’ data.
Also, this week 10,000 mt of ex-India billet have been sold at $635/mt CFR to the Philippines, though this has not been confirmed by the time of publication, but market sources said that in this case some discounts of up to $10/mt on the general market level have been provided as the billets are produced at induction furnaces.
Demand for billet in other Southeast Asian countries has not improved. “Thailand is on holiday this week. Not much is happening here,” a source said. The lowest offers of ex-Iran billet from traders have been heard at $625/mt CFR, but some suppliers have already increased asking prices to as much as $640/mt CFR for June shipment.
In the import billet market in China, trading activity has been lower this week and the tradable levels have not changed or have declined slightly. Though ex-ASEAN billet suppliers have been asking $670/mt CFR since last week, they have failed to achieve deals at higher prices. The latest bookings from Indonesia, Vietnam and Malaysia were reported at about $660/mt CFR late last week and early this week. The tradable value for non-ASEAN billet, which is a subject to two percent import duty, is $645-650/mt CFR in the current market conditions, but a number of market sources report lower bids for some imports. After a drop of local billet prices in China on Monday, the market prices have improved, but have failed to reach the previous levels so far. Today, local billet prices from mills in Tangshan are at RMB 4,960/mt ($760/mt) ex-works, up by RMB 40/mt ($6/mt) from Monday’s level, but still RMB 100/mt ($15/mt) lower than late last week.
$1 = RMB 6.5297