CIS producers' billet offers have not shown any great change this week compared to the previous week. While producers' price levels are still at $660-670/mt FOB for April shipments, the lower offers of the trading firms, which had taken positions at lower levels in past weeks, have practically disappeared this week. On the other hand, the Far East market, which has entered the Chinese Lunar Year holiday, may be replaced by the revival in demand seen in Italy and and also by the Persian Gulf region, which is reported to have returned to the market again. It is also heard that Latin America, which has been demanding longs products in recent times, has purchased billet from the CIS.
Turkish producers have been offering to the export market this week at the price level of $700-710/mt FOB. They have been showing a lack of interest in counter offers at $690/mt FOB coming from the Arabian Peninsula. In the same way, Turkish producers have not been showing much interest in vanadium-added billet offers from the Far East at price levels of slightly above $700/mt.
In the early days of the week, things were somewhat different in the local Turkish billet market compared to the Turkish export market. Rebar rolling mills have been unwilling to make billet purchases due to the relatively weak local market, with the result that billet demand in the local market in particular has been limited. Billet prices have been in the range of $670-690/mt ex-works in the regions of Marmara, Izmir and Iskenderun. Besides this, although the sale of a cargo of 15,000 tons of billet from Sivas to Iskenderun at the price level of $650/mt delivered to Iskenderun caused a little confusion, the market did not give in to negative expectations, especially once it heard that the sale was an exceptional one. Meanwhile, Isdemir closed its billet sales at the price level $690/mt as of February 6. The Turkish billet market may gain some momentum in the upcoming period thanks to two factors: one is the local market, which has been registering some activity towards the end of the week; and the other is the long products export market, which has been active throughout the week.
Billet prices worldwide seem strong in general. Considerably strong trends have been seen in Ukraine, Turkey, Brazil and Russia. The latest deals to the Far East, Southeastern Asia and the Persian Gulf in the price range of $750-770/mt CFR are evidence of the strong trend in question. Scrap prices are uncertain while iron ore and pig iron prices are fairly strong. The trend of scrap price movement may help determine the direction of the global billet market.