Indian billet suppliers have still not been interested in exports in the past week as, even though local quotations showed visible declines, the competition in the export market was too strong and bearish conditions have continued to worsen across key destinations, SteelOrbis learned from trade and industry circles on Wednesday, February 2.
Ex-India billet offer prices have been kept unchanged at $500-520/mt FOB and the tradable level has remained for sellers at $480-500/mt FOB at the lowest, but it is largely considered notional since buyers are asking for deep discounts and prices ranging $450-480/mt FOB, which are unacceptable for Indian sellers. Tough competition with Chinese traders who can offer $500-505/mt CFR to Southeast Asia is the major issue for the halting of Indian billet exports.
The sources said that most government mills which largely predominate in the export of semis under normal market conditions have internally taken the decision to not float any export tenders in the current market conditions, though this is not being officially stated.
“The severe bearish conditions of the market and export opportunities vanishing can be gauged from the fact that even deep discounted offers by Indian sellers are not on a par with acceptable CFR price of overseas buyers. No Indian mill can match below $500/mt CFR without taking a hit on their bottom line,” a source at a private mill said.
An official with a government run mill said that, despite local merchant billet sales prices moving on a strong downtrend, producers are unwilling to enter overseas markets and prefer pushing local sales even at lower prices as realizations are better.
Sources said that billet trade prices are down INR 1,900/mt ($23/mt) over the past two weeks to INR 48,300/mt ($583/mt) ex-Mumbai and down INR 2,950/mt ($36/mt) to INR 45,850/mt ($553/mt) ex-Raipur in the central region.
$1 = INR 82.80
