Domestic rebar demand has increased significantly over the past two weeks Germany and pushed up the local prices. Spot stocks are low in the country taking into account that the traders have only bought material for their urgent needs in the fear of Covid-19 measures and lockdowns. However, with better weather conditions, demand has started to increase very rapidly and the market participants foresee good demand for the upcoming months at least until the end of June. Prices have increased by €30/mt over the past week to €660-690/mt ex-works, also with the support of the higher scrap prices.
On the other hand another strict lockdown is expected in Germany for the coming 6-8 weeks. For now traders do not foresee any negative effect as they believe that the business chain has already adapted to such conditions. "Stocks have remained low and demand has increased very fast with better weather conditions. Also there are a lot of postponed projects due to Covid-19 restrictions and they are expected to start in the upcoming days. In this outlook we expect to see better demand and higher prices in the German rebar market," a trader told SteelOrbis.
In the export market, prices have also increased by €20/mt to €640-650/mt and demand from the export destinations has also picked up. Export prices have already been accepted by Austrian buyers and last week sales have been done to this destination.