Turkish buyers, seeing weak scrap prices, insufficient local and export longs sales, as well as still rather high import billet offers from most suppliers, have continued to purchase domestic billet, which is priced fairly and can be booked in smaller lots. Billet from Russia and Donbass, the occupied territory in Ukraine, has remained an exception since it is currently the cheapest import origin available.
Turkey’s integrated Kardemir has announced new billet sales in the domestic market at $492/mt ex-works for S235JR grade and $502/mt ex-works for B420 grade, in line with the latest prices offered in early September. The producer closed trade within a short period of time, having sold almost 65,000 mt to its regular customers, mainly based in the Karabuk region.
Other mills in Turkey are currently offering billet at similar levels - at $495-500/mt ex-works in the Iskenderun region, while last week over 40,000 mt were sold in this region at $500-508/mt ex-works depending on the lead time and volume. In the Izmir region, the offer level is at $500-505/mt ex-works, being workable for small billet lots, sources report.
Import billet offers from Asia have mainly remained out of Turkey’s range of interest due to the long lead time - most cargoes are for end-of-November shipments or late December arrivals. China is still offering at $480/mt CFR, while ex-Malaysian offers have moved down by $5/mt to $485/mt CFR, while further slight discounts might be applicable. Ukraine’s supplier is in the market with the same $490/mt CFR offers for November shipments, while Turkish buyers seem to be aiming for levels $5-10/m lower for now.
The latest workable prices from Russia, as SteelOrbis has reported this week, stood at $450/mt CFR in small deals to the Karabuk region, down from $460/mt CFR and slightly higher seen earlier in offers. “Sales are not bad. The buyers say that the latest amendments to the import regime make them seek $450/mt CFR Zonguldak,” a seller told SteelOrbis. Some sources, however, stated that there are bids at as low as $445/mt CFR. The SteelOrbis daily reference price for ex-Russia billet remains firm at $430/mt FOB.