Romanian long steel retailers have struggled to maintain increased price levels for long steel products and have finally offered discounts. The main reason is the ongoing weakness of domestic demand on the end-user side and the resulting tight competition between traders in the domestic market. Another factor is the imbalance between increasing scrap prices and the struggling longs business across the EU, contrary to the situation in the flats segment.
As a result, Romanian retailers' feasible rebar prices have declined by €10-20/mt to €670-680/mt ex-warehouse, while, according to sources, certain traders are buying from a single producer and trying to sell at €690/mt ex-works. Presently, rebar prices from the domestic mill have stabilized over the past week to €650-660/mt ex-works.
Meanwhile, wire rod prices have remained stable in the market overall, around €675-680/mt ex-warehouse, with just some large traders trying to sell in the range of €690-700/mt ex-warehouse.
Moreover, in the import segment, there were offers from Greece for rebar and wire rod at €700-710/mt CFR and €720-730/mt CFR respectively for April shipment. While from Italy offers for rebar and wire rod were at €640/mt FCA and €655-670/mt FCA. The delivery cost to Romania is estimated by the local market players at €40/mt, therefore Romanian buyers might consider €680/mt and €695-710/mt for rebar and wire rod, respectively, both on the delivered basis.
Additionally, one of the Ukrainian mills is offering wire rod at around €740/mt delivered to Romania, while the second Ukrainian supplier is currently out of the market due to its limited product allocation.
On the other hand, according to market players, Turkey's offers have increased significantly following the earthquakes and they are not competitive now, resulting in no interest from Romania. The estimated ex-Turkey rebar price level is around €735-750/mt CFR at the $1 = €0.95 exchange rate and about €25-30/mt freight.
