Demand for Turkish rebar in the international markets is still weak. Having raised their rebar export prices last week despite weak demand given the increase in scrap quotations, Turkish mills have struggled to conclude export sales at $490-505/mt FOB. Also, it is observed that Turkish steelmakers are facing downward pressure on their rebar export offers from buyers in their now very limited number of target markets. As a result, they have reduced their rebar export offers by an average of $5/mt in the current week to $485-500/mt FOB.
Although scrap suppliers have this week been targeting higher prices compared to last week’s levels, it is observed that Turkish mills have not accepted higher scrap offers due to their tighter profit margins, since they failed to reflect higher scrap prices in their rebar sales prices. As a result, they are trying to keep their scrap purchase prices at last week’s levels.
While Turkish steel mills have lost their main export markets, the US and the European Union, due to the 50 percent import duty and import quotas, respectively, they have continued sales to the markets to which they regularly conclude sales of small tonnages, such as Israel and Yemen. SteelOrbis has been informed that Turkish mills are receiving weak demand from Africa with sales of small tonnages to the region being concluded at $485/mt FOB, though for higher tonnages buyers’ firm bids are far lower than this price level.