Ex-India billet prices have been kept unchanged over the past week despite quiet trading activity in most key destinations and continued declines in local sales with large mills holding back offers expecting a turnaround in market conditions soon, SteelOrbis learned from trade and industry circles on Wednesday, February 25.
Sources said that ex-India billet offers are stable in the range of $455-460/mt FOB and a few stray bids have been heard at around $430/mt FOB, but no deals have been confirmed as both buyers and sellers have preferred to wait for business activities to gather pace in China and the Middle East toward early next month.
According to the sources, pressures have been mounting on mills following the downslide in the local market gaining momentum, but producers have been stalling aggressive price cuts for overseas sales, anticipating that prices in key destinations are near the bottom and may recover once business activity resumes at full pace in the Middle East after Ramadan.
In the local India market, merchant sales of semis have suffered setbacks amid a lower off-take following setbacks in long steel products. Billet trade prices have lost INR 300/mt ($3/mt) to INR 43,000/mt ($473/mt) ex-Mumbai and have declined by a larger margin of INR 1,000/mt ($11/mt) to INR 40,000/mt ($440/mt) ex-Raipur in the central region.
“Despite the weak mood in local and export outlets, sellers are still optimistic of a rebound in March. By then a new trend can be expected to emerge and hence the sellers are not changing their market pricing,” an official at an Indian mill said.
“We do not need to take a very short-term view of the market. The fundamentals of demand in both domestic and overseas markets have not changed much and new support will emerge,” he said.
