South Korea Billet Imports continues to be stable, Nov’17

South Korea one of the major billet importer has imported about 120,000 MT Billet in November 2017, the trade statistics released by the South Korean custom reported.

The nation’s monthly imports for Billet are almost firm in November 2017, which is being similar from last couple of months. During the month, Japan has exported about 91.67% billet (110,000 MT) to South Korea.

Coming to total imports in CY 2017 (Jan-Nov), the nation has imported about 1.98 MnT Billet; down by 25.56% as compared to 2.66 MnT in the same preceding last year. Inline, on yearly basis in Nov’17, imports of billet to the nation decline by 47.82% against 230,000 MT in Nov’16.

In the first 11 months of 2017 (Jan-Nov) – Japan, Indonesia & Brazil was the major billet exporter to South Korea which exported about 1,040,000 MT (52.21%), 300,000 MT (15.16%) & 260,000 MT (13.06%), 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-Nov) – Russia, China & India was the major pig iron exporter to South Korea which exported about 100,000 MT (44.43%), 60,000 MT (25.6%) & 20,000 MT (8.81%), respectively.

While in November 2017, it is observed that the nation has imported about 10,000 MT Pig Iron similar to last month.

In context to export prices, global offers for steel grade pig Iron is assessed at USD 345-350/MT FoB India & USD 350-360/MT FOB Russia.

Top load Country (Jan-Nov’17), Billet

Quantity in MnT
Sources: SteelMint Stats