Ex-India billet prices have increased a little further over the past week, with sellers gaining more confidence after a few government-run mills were successful in driving sales at higher levels and private mills were heard to have begun submitting offers to key markets with renewed optimism, SteelOrbis learned from trade and industry circles on Wednesday July 30.
A few large Indian government mills have been able to push deals at $440-445/mt FOB, up from the previous tradable level at $435/mt FOB, indicating that buyers have been willing to accept the price rise seen in the previous week and that the market may have bottomed out in the current cycle prompted by sharp increases in input costs.
An eastern India-based mill of a government steel producer reported a spot sale of 30,000 mt of prime concast billet for September shipment at $440/mt FOB, while another government-run mill concluded a sale for delivery to the Gulf of 20,000 mt of billet at $445/mt FOB.
The sources said that some large private mills which had been absent from exports have begun submitting offers, some as high as $450/mt FOB, and, though deals have not yet been successful, there is a lot of optimism over demand for semis rebounding, provided prices in China are able to sustain the recent gains.
“The sentiments and mood are much better. But we are cautious and the mood may be improving at a faster rate than warranted by fundamentals. Billet prices may have been pushed up too fast too soon. There are already signs of a price correction in China and finished steel prices are yet to consolidate sufficiently that they would justify the hikes seen in prices of semis,” a source at Jindal Steel Limited said.
“We advise more rationality in expectations. We will be cautious and conservative in submitting any new billet export offers and resist moving ahead of the market,” the source said.
Meanwhile, in the local market, billet prices havesurged in line with speculative gains seen recently in rebar prices. Trade-level billet prices have gained INR 1,300/mt ($15/mt) to INR 40,100/mt ($460/mt) ex-Mumbai and are up INR 800/mt ($9/mt) to INR 37,600/mt ($431/mt) ex-Raipur in the central region.