After nearly two months of silence, Bangladesh’s imported scrap market saw a recovery in trading this week. Industry experts said that market sentiments have improved and sporadic contracts are heard to have taken place in the last few days.
However, domestic market sentiments are swaying between concerns about the tight money rotation and opening new LCs specifically among established mills located at Chattogram who prefer letters of credit for bulk scrap vessels, said market insiders.
It is difficult to foresee the near-term price trend as it is structured on economic parameters related to a monetary factor that may affect the exchange rate. If the value of Bangladesh Taka (BDT) against the US dollar goes down, imported scrap prices are likely to move up, however, if BDT remains constant, a slight contraction in imported prices may be seen, said one of the trade participants.
Currently, BDT is being traded at 105.9 against the dollar.
Offers and deals-
- Containerised offers for UK-origin shredded scrap are at $455-460/t CFR, inching down by $5/t w-o-w.
- A small quantity of USA-origin shredded has been booked at $440/t CFR Chittagong.
- Meanwhile, containerised UK-origin HMS 1&2 (80:20) is offered at $420/t CFR Chittagong, down by $5-10/t w-o-w.
- Around 1,000 t of Brazilian HMS has been booked at $442/t CFR.
Meanwhile, major scrap suppliers from the US and Europe have sold out their material to traditional bulk buyer – Turkiye – at increased offers earlier in the month, considering the upcoming winter holidays.
Now, offers are being quoted for January- February shipments considering the upcoming Christmas and New Year holidays. Bookings may resume from the second week of January 2023, SteelMint understands.
On the other hand, local scrap prices continued to move up due to limited material available in the domestic market. Local scrap is currently being traded at BDT 62,500/t ex-yards, up by BDt 1,000/t w-o-w.
Bulk scrap offers
Imported bulk scrap offers increased further. However, buyers were mostly quiet for bulk cargo bookings.
- Indicative offers for Japanese H2 are at $425/t CFR, moving up by over $5/t w-o-w after the recently-concluded Kanto tender.
- Furthermore, US-origin bulk scrap offers are now being quoted at $430-435/t CFR level, up by $5/ w-o-w.
Domestic market extends silence
The domestic finished steel market remained moderate to bearish as a result of liquidity issues.
SteelMint-assessed domestic rebar prices are at BDT 91,000-94,000/t ($859-887/t) exw-Chittagong. However, the medium secondary mills in Dhaka have kept their rebar offers unchanged w-o-w at BDT 85,000/t ($802/t). Meanwhile, buying prices still lower by BDT 4,000-5,000/t exw due to low demand from end users.
“The market is likely to remain steady as the government has broadly indicated that big projects will take time, so requirements will be limited,” said a reliable market source.
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