This week the Turkish wire rod market has not been influenced much by the slackening on the raw material and semi-finished side. Due to the deliveries of previously concluded wire rod export transactions, some difficulties are being experienced in the local Turkish wire rod market regarding deliveries to local buyers. While it is expected that the slackening of rebar prices may influence wire rod prices, this expectation appears unlikely to be fulfilled for the time being as order books for wire rods are more full compared to order books for rebars.
Looking at the situation as regards Turkish wire rod exports this week, we see that the price levels of Turkish wire rods for the export markets are in general at $490-510/mt FOB for November shipments. Besides, in one of the major Turkish wire rod export markets, namely, the Middle East, competitive Chinese origin export offers have continued to be heard this week. Also, it is said that ex-China boron-added wire rod offers to Dubai (the leading Middle Eastern market) are at $490-510/mt C&F. Meanwhile, as a result of natural disasters in some Far Eastern markets and also given that China has increased its effectiveness in the Far East markets, the number of price inquiries from this region has decreased a bit.
In southern Europe, wire rod buyers in Spain are not in the front line as an export market due to high stock levels. On the other hand, a slight softening is being observed in the Italian wire rod market, with mesh quality wire rods at the range of €340-350/mt ex-works in this local market. It seems that the Italian producers are willing to negotiate in order to book orders. Wire rod buyers in Italy that seek to buy wire rod only to satisfy their needs seem to be waiting further for new import wire rod deals.
Meanwhile, in the aftermath of the general elections wire rod buyers in Greece are now following a wait-and-see policy as regards new purchases. Meanwhile, it is heard that there are some price inquiries from Nigeria to Turkey on the export side.
Since the demand tightening in the international wire rod markets is having an increasing impact on exports, some Turkish wire rod producers are paying more attention to drawing quality wire rod sales and sales to firms that produce nails of specific qualities. In parallel to this situation, it is heard that a producer has in the past week concluded a deal for 10,000 mt of drawing quality wire rods from Turkey to the US at $520/mt FOB for November shipment. It is reported that talks are continuing to maintain the flow of orders from the US.