China's welded pipe market has maintained its upward trend over the past two weeks with support from increased production costs, though demand from local customers has weakened amid slower construction activity during the summer. Export demand also remains sluggish as buyers consider the current price increase not well-grounded and expect the trend to be reversed soon. Over the past two weeks, Chinese mills' domestic welded pipe quotations have increased by around RMB 100/mt ($16/mt), while offers of Chinese traders to the local market have moved up by RMB 100-110/mt ($16-18/mt). Export prices of Chinese welded pipes have gone up by about $10/mt over the past two weeks.
Chinese welded pipe suppliers may try to continue their upward price trend in the coming period despite no signs of a rebound in demand. However, the uptrend might be short-lived as weak demand from both local and foreign buyers, coupled with unstable prices for import iron ore, will weigh on welded pipe prices from Chinese suppliers.
Current offers of locally produced 2"-6" welded pipes of grade B as per ASTM A53 are being given to the Chinese domestic market at an average of RMB 4,300-4,400/mt ($696-713/mt) ex-works. These local market welded pipe prices include 17 percent VAT. Traders in Shanghai are offering Q215-Q235 welded pipes made to GB/T3091 at around RMB 3,760-3,880/mt ($609-628/mt) ex-warehouse, while stockists in the cities of Tianjin and Beijing are offering similar pipes at RMB 3,640-3,720/mt ($589-602/mt) ex-warehouse.
Current export prices of welded pipes from large Chinese mills, 2"-10" grade B according to ASTM A53, are at around $640-670/mt FOB on actual weight basis.