South Korea Billet Import Analysis, October 2017

South Korea the world’s 4th largest billet importer has imported about 120,000 MT Billet in October 2017, the trade statistics released by the South Korean custom reported.

The nation’s monthly imports for Billet is almost firm in October 2017, which is similar against September 2017. In the month, Japan has exported about 75% billet (90,000 MT) to South Korea.

Coming to total imports in CY 2017 (Jan-Oct), the nation has imported about 1.87 MnT Billet; down by 23.04% as compared to 2.43 MnT in the same preceding last year. Inline, on yearly basis in Oct’17, imports of billet to the nation decline by 40% against 200,000 MT in Oct’16.

In the first 10 months of 2017 (Jan-Oct) – Japan, Indonesia & Brazil was the major billet exporter to South Korea which exported about 930,000 MT (49.76%), 300,000 MT (16.12%) & 250,000 MT (13.60%), respectively.

Prior to this, in CY 2016 (Jan-Dec) the country’s billet import was around 2.80 MnT & in CY 2015 at 2.39 MnT.

Russia continues to remain the largest Pig iron supplier to South Korea

In 2017 (Jan-Oct) – Russia, China & India was the major pig iron exporter to South Korea which exported about 90,000 MT (44.35%), 60,000 MT (26.37%) & 20,000 MT (9.08%), respectively.

While in October 2017, it is observed that the nation has imported about 10,000 MT Pig Iron.

In context to export prices, global offers for steel grade pig Iron is assessed at USD 325-345/MT FoB India & USD 330-340/MT FOB Russia

Top Load Country (Jan – Oct’17), Billet

Quantity in MnT
Sources: SteelMint Stats.