Local Indian billet prices have softened during the past week, as both integrated steel mills and secondary mills reduced their conversion of billet volumes to rebar. Moreover, the situation in the export market has been unfavorable for Indian sellers, while one domestic steel mill was faced with the cancelation of an export contract concluded earlier, SteelOrbis has learned on Wednesday, February 19.
The workable level for ex-India billet was $400/mt FOB as the highest this week, versus offers at $408-410/mt FOB last week. But at the moment most sellers are cautious in offering, seeing a big difference between local and export prices and trying to evaluate the situation after China came back to Southeast Asia with attractive billet export offers.
The sources said that a contract by an eastern India-based steel mill with an Asian buyer for March shipment of 12,000 mt was cancelled and, though the exporter did not officially cite any reason, the market speculated that the cancellation was from the importer’s side.
Local billet prices have lost INR 400/mt ($6/mt) over the past week, coming to INR 31,100/mt ($435/mt) ex-stockyard as integrated steel mills reported a rise in inventories as they were lowering captive conversion to rebar and a fall in merchant sales to secondary rebar producers in the face of the overall slump in rebar prices and stock movements, traders said.