Global View on Billet: No big change in prices or mood, but discounted sales accelerate

This week has been rather calm in the global billet market and both prices and market sentiments have been almost unchanged in the major outlets. However, trading has improved in Turkey and Asia after sellers provided some discounts to boost export sales. Next week is also expected to be silent with the long holiday in China and the new trend is expected to settle in mid-October.

In Turkey, domestic billet has remained in demand due to shorter lead times compared to most import offers and acceptable pricing. This week, integrated producer Kardemir has sold 64,500 mt of billet after announcing a new round of offers at $492/mt ex-works for S235JR material and $502/mt ex-works for B420. In the other regions of Turkey, offers have settled at $500-505/mt ex-works Izmir region and $495-505/mt ex-works Iskenderun.

Import offers from China are at $475-480/mt CFR for November shipments, slightly down from earlier this week and down $5/mt over the past week. No fresh transactions have been reported as most buyers finding this level high for Chinese billet and the bids are mainly below $465-470/mt CFR. Malaysia is in the market with offers at around $485/mt CFR, down $5/mt over the past week, with additional $5/mt discounts considered possible. One of the Ukrainian mills remains at $490/mt CFR in offers for November, with slight discounts possible in the case of firm demand from buyers.

As for supplies from Russia, the latest workable prices in the Turkish market stood at $450/mt CFR in small sales to the Karabuk region, according to sources, while earlier the offer levels stood at $460/mt CFR and slightly above. The buyers are concerned regarding the inward processing regime amendments and are trying to evaluate the possible impact on their import operations. The latest bids generally do not exceed $450/mt CFR, while some buyers are insisting on $445/mt CFR. The SteelOrbis daily reference price for ex-Russia billet to be shipped from the Black sea has remained firm at $430/mt FOB throughout the week, while down $7.5/mt compared to the previous reference prices.

The ex-China reference billet price stands at $430-440/mt FOB, versus $430-450/mt FOB late last week. But this is an indicative decline, based on sentiments and the gradual decline in futures prices. On the one hand, the Chinese market is supported by some gradual improvement in demand ahead of the National Day holiday and the newly released work plan for the steel industry in 2025-26, which will support value-added output growth at four percent. However, on the other hand, local prices are stable and BF utilization is above 90 percent, so inventory is still climbing.

A few small-volume deals for 10,000 mt each of 150 mm 5SP Chinese billet are reported to have been done to the Philippines at around $460/mt CFR or just slightly lower late last week and early this week. $455/mt CFR was the buyers’ target, but it was hard to achieve, so the tradable level is near $460/mt CFR so far, stable over the past week. The latest trades for ex-China 3SP were done a week ago at $455/mt CFR to Indonesia, while this week buyers’ price ideas are not above $450/mt CFR.

Russian suppliers selling from Far East ports have decided to provide some discounts in order to sign deals to Taiwan, while no lower prices have been seen in rare deals for Asian origin billets in the Far East region. A decent volume of ex-Russia Far East 3SP billet was sold to Taiwan at $440-443/mt CFR last week, while an additional tonnage of vanadium-added billet changed hands at $460/mt CFR. This means that the exporter provided $7-10/mt discounts on the initially offered $450/mt CFR seen in mid-September. Ex-Russia billet prices have been the most competitive in the Asian region recently, with the lowest ex-Iran 3SP offers at $450/mt CFR. Considering the very narrow geography of sales available to Russian exporters due to sanctions after Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, in Asia Russia can sell sizable volumes only to Taiwan and only small tonnages may go to the Philippines and Thailand.

Ex-Indonesia billet offers were at $445/mt FOB in the middle of this week, down by $2-3/mt from late last week.

Indian mills have been active in pushing offers in the Middle East, keeping prices unchanged in the range of $430-440/mt FOB, but the bids received have been lower and, with buyers seeking $445-450/mt CFR Gulf, which translates to $425/mt FOB at best, deals have failed to work out. Despite a lack of trade activity, sellers remain optimistic for a demand revival in November and expect that buyers’ resistance to current prices will ease over the next few weeks. In this situation, together with the local market stabilizing in terms of price and off-take, mills have been unwilling to cut offer levels in a hurry and have preferred to wait for the export market to consolidate.