Demand slackens in local Turkish rebar market contrary to expectations

After reaching a new record at TRY 2,730/mt on Tuesday, February 13, in Turkey’s Marmara region, domestic rebar prices in Turkey moved sideways in the following days of last week. With some Turkish steel mills observed to have closed their domestic rebar sales, it was believed that they were waiting for the current week to reopen their domestic rebar sales at higher prices.

However, the Turkish lira has gained strength against the US dollar over the weekend, preventing domestic prices from moving up and also causing buyers to slow down their price inquiries as compared to last week. As a result, demand in the local Turkish rebar market has slackened at the start of the current week, contrary to previous expectations for strong rebar demand in the local Turkish market this week as buyers - who have not made any stock purchases for a long time now - were foreseen to step up their purchases ahead of the approaching peak season for infrastructure work and construction.

Under the current circumstances, it is observed that the upward movement of domestic rebar prices in Turkey has come to an end for now, despite the tightening of supply in the local Turkish rebar market. As compared to SteelOrbis’ report on February 15, domestic rebar prices in Turkey’s Karabuk and Iskenderun regions have decreased by TRY 8/mt and by TRY 34/mt, respectively. In the other regions, domestic rebar quotations have moved sideways on Turkish lira basis. Meanwhile, it is seen that prices have indicated diverse trends on dollar basis in the same period due to the fluctuation of the exchange rate.

As of today, February 19, traders’ rebar offers in the Turkish domestic market are as follows:

All prices are ex-warehouse and on actual weight basis and exclude VAT.

$1 = TRY 3.75