Indian billet exports is seeing a descending fall in Feb’18 even though the initial month of 2018 Indian bulk billet exports inched up on Month-on-Month basis in Jan’18. Indian bulk exports of billets were recorded at 60,500 MT (including bloom) in Feb’18 against 72,000 MT in Jan’18, down 16% M-o-M. In Dec’17 Indian bulk billet exports stood at 70,570 MT.
In the domestic trade, realization was quite good because of the higher prices and the traders were not going in for the export market because of lower global prices .
Reasons behind fall in Indian bulk billet export volumes-
1. Higher realization in domestic market: – Domestic billet prices in India remained on the higher side amid high sponge iron and finished steel prices. Also increased trades supported high prices. Domestic billet prices stood at INR 34,600/MT (ex-Mumbai) in beginning of Jan’18 which moved up further to INR 35,400/MT.
2. Limited export allocations: – Amid strong domestic demand, mills focused more on domestic sales and this limited their allocations for export.
3. Decline in global billet prices in Jan’18: – Global billet export offers declined in Jan’18. Export offers from CIS nations declined from USD 520/MT, FoB Black Sea in beginning of Jan’18 to USD 495-500/MT, FoB towards the month end. Lower global prices and comparatively high domestic prices must have resulted in damped the buying interest of Indian exporters.
Indian billet exports in 2017 expected to reach 2.8 MnT – According to customs data maintained with SteelMint, Indian billet exports were recorded at 2.55 MnT during Jan-Nov’17. Largest importer was Nepal with 1 MnT followed by Indonesia, Philippines and Sri Lanka. Exports in the entire CY17 is expected to reach 2.8 MnT.
| FY18 | EXPORT | IMPORT | |||
| Month | Billet | Bloom | Slab | TMT | Slab |
| May 17 | – | 22,500 | 72,500 | 5,400 | – |
| Jun 17 | – | – | 45,300 | – | – |
| Jul 17 | 42,400 | 15,000 | – | 5,000 | 93,240 |
| Aug 17 | 42,000 | – | – | 10,000 | 44,560 |
| Sep 17 | 126,300 | – | 24,000 | 5,000 | – |
| Oct 17 | 132,220 | – | – | 10,200 | – |
| Nov 17 | 137,220 | – | 26,500 | 39,270 | 44,160 |
| Dec 17 | 60,070 | 10,500 | – | 91,686 | – |
| Jan 18 | 61,200 | 10,800 | – | 69,370 | 50,200 |
| Feb 18 | 52,500 | 8,000 | – | 68,310 | 11,100 |
| Grand Total | 653,910 | 66,800 | 168,300 | 304,236 | 243,260 |
Source: SteelMint, Qty in MT
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