India’s Sponge iron export offers to Bangladesh have remained firm, as per SteelMint’s weekly assessment. The offers remained unaltered on account of fluctuating demand & prices in domestic market & steady offers of imported scrap to Bangladesh.
As per exporters in Kolkata, eastern India, demand is on average basis, however further up-tick depends on imported scrap offers to Bangladesh.
The current offers for Indian origin sponge iron FeM 78-80 hovering at USD 345/MT CPT Benapole (dry port of India & Bangladesh) & USD 365/MT CFR Chittagong, Bangladesh.
Further the offers for containerized Shredded grade scrap being stable on weekly basis and are evaluated at USD 375/MT, CFR Chittagong, Bangladesh.
As per calculations, the input cost of Bangladeshi mills will be similar either to melt scrap or sponge iron. Hence buying interest continue to remain on average basis for sponge iron and will surge if imported scrap offers climb further.
On an average the mills in Dhaka & Chittagong, Bangladesh are melting scrap near about 90-95% and remaining is sponge iron to produce a tone of hot metal.
As per customs data maintained by SteelMint, India’s monthly sponge iron exports to Bangladesh is about 25,000-30,000 MT and are recorded at around 233,879 MT during Jan-Aug’18.
It seems that the sponge exports to Bangladesh will remain strong in coming days as supply crunch of scrap to rise globally on seasonal concerns, which will increase demand for Indian sponge iron.
Leave a Reply