The Italian billet market appears to have come to a standstill. Local rebar mills holding back from purchasing raw materials due to the bearish situation in the finished products market. As SteelOrbis has heard, the last deal for Italian billet concluded by local mills took place 10-20 days ago at a price level of €290-305/mt ex-mill.
Meanwhile, ex-Black Sea offers for 120 x 120 mm - 150 x 150 mm x 6-12 m billets are still encountering resistance in Italy at levels of $420-430/mt CIF. This price range has not gained acceptance given current rebar price levels.
Nobody is going out on a limb to predict the state of the Italian billet market in September, and no one can say what kind of situation the mills, market players and traders are going to face when the mills reopen four or five weeks from now. The prevalent mood at the current time is one of gloom, on account of some obvious factors. First of all, the mills are scheduled to close down for the summer holidays for four weeks. In addition, the local finished products market has not been showing any signs of improvement at all, on the contrary it seems to be getting worse. Furthermore, billet stocks are still at high levels. Thus, it is not hard to comprehend why, against the background of the current standstill in trading activity, Italian mills are not expected to resume their billet purchases for a long time yet.