According to market sources, demand in the local United Arab Emirates (UAE) rebar market has remained stable over the past week at medium levels. The declines seen in oil prices continue to cause buyers to maintain a cautious stance towards rebar purchases, hindering the strengthening of rebar demand in the UAE and resulting in ongoing pressure on prices.
Meanwhile, Turkish steel producers have not reflected the increase in their rebar export prices in their prices for the UAE market and so their rebar offers to the country are still at $330-335/mt CFR. Also, it is reported that rebar offers from Oman are being given to the UAE at $370/mt CPT. Meanwhile, UAE-based producers’ rebar prices for their domestic market have remained unchanged week on week in the range of AED 1,385-1,400/mt ($378-382/mt) ex-works, while local traders’ prices are still at AED 1,470-1,480/mt ($401-404/mt) ex-warehouse. However, market sources state that traders are offering discounts of AED 10-20/mt ($3-6/mt) for bookings of large tonnages.
On the other hand, local producer Emirates Steel Industries (ESI) is due to announce its February output rebar offers in the coming days and is expected to keep its prices stable or to decrease them slightly as compared to its prices for January output materials. Market players state that the downward pressure on import and local rebar prices will increase if ESI cuts its prices by a larger margin than expected.
$1 = AED 3.67