Ex-India billet prices have been kept stable in the past week, but most large mills have continued to hold back offers, taking their cue from negative sentiments across Asia and instead focusing on local sales, where the market has been seeing a faster off-take of semis by secondary mills, leading to better prices, SteelOrbis learned from trade and industry circles on Wednesday, February 12.
The SteelOrbis Indian billet export reference price is unchanged at $440-460/mt FOB even as government mills have remained completely absent from exports, while most private mills are not submitting offers, perceiving the current workable price of around $440/mt FOB as being unviable to sellers.
According to the sources, there is a lot of uncertainty over how a new price direction will be set by ex-China material and the outlook for finished steel continues to be negative, prompting buyers to either stay away from import bookings or only seek very low prices.
“We are not submitting offers as we do not expect deals to materialise since buyers are very price-sensitive across Asia. Sellers are looking to increase prices perceiving the market to have bottomed out. But Asian buyers see further downside potential once a new price trend emerges from China,” a source at Jindal Steel and Power Limited said.
“We also do not see it as viable to aggressively price ex-India offers to push overseas sales, as the domestic movement of semis across the supply chain in looking good. Secondary mills’ offtake of semis is increasing and getting reflected in billet prices,” the source said.
Reacting to faster off-take, billet trade prices have surged by INR 1,100/mt ($13/mt) ex-Mumbai and gained INR 900/mt ($10/mt) to INR 39,500/mt ($455/mt) ex-Raipur in the central region.
$1 = INR 86.76