Import scrap prices in India have continued to surge over the past week, but buyers have been hesitant in committing new bookings amid an oxygen shortage and low plant capacity utilizations of secondary steel mills, and there has been a shift to direct reduction iron (DRI) to meet limited raw material requirements, SteelOrbis learned from trade and industry circles on Wednesday, May 12.
Sources said that ex-US containerized shredded scrap prices are at $480-490/mt CFR Nhava Sheva port in the west, up from trades concluded in the range of $470-480/mt CFR a week ago, but no trade has been reported in the market over the past week.
At least one source said that he had heard of one offer as high as $500/mt CFR, but others could not definitively confirm this in the absence of any deals reported in the market.
“Stray deals seen in earlier weeks done by secondary mills facing emergency raw material stocking have completely dwindled over the past few days. Whatever small volumes of raw materials are needed to keep mills running at sub-optimal levels is being met through DRI and small-volumes of local scrap,” a member of the Metal Recycling Association of India (MRAI) said.
“At a time when domestic demand for rebar is weakening with construction activities reaching a standstill, secondary steel mills have no appetite to take risks of restocking ferrous scrap at such high prices,” he said.
Sources said that in the local market no quotes are available from stockyards like Alang in the west, as scrap traders and aggregators do not have any stocks with shipbreaking at most yards not operational as the government has banned the use of oxygen necessary for cutting torches.
$1 = INR 73.40