The Brazilian government closed an investigation on Thursday
into the dumping of flat steel products by five countries after finding that
the practice did not hurt local mills.
The probe, which local steelmaker CSN filed with an Industry
and Trade Ministry body in October 2010, had sought evidence that exports of
rolled and zinc-coated flat products from Australia, South Korea, China, India
and Mexico were entering the Brazilian market at prices below production costs.
CSN, the nation's second-largest producer of flat steel
products, had the support of larger rival Usiminas and the local unit of
ArcelorMittal, the world's biggest steelmaker, to push for the investigation.
Evidence showed that imports of coil and similar products
did not affect the already strong market position of local steelmakers in
Brazil. In the decision, Decom cited a local steel distributor which resorted
to imports from some of those countries because CSN, which has almost full
control of the domestic coil market, tightened payment deadlines.
Some of the foreign companies mentioned in the probe include
Dongbu Steel, Union Steel and Hyundai Hysco from South Korea, the Mexican unit
of South Korea's Posco , China's Baosteel, and Australia's Bluescope Steel .
For decades, prices of local steel products enjoyed premiums
of as much as 35 percent over international prices as government tax breaks and
high tariffs curbed demand for imported bars, rods, hot-rolled coil and plates.
But the phasing out of price premiums, which began to take
place at the time CSN requested the investigation, plunged some local mills
into their worst crisis in years.
Steelmakers in Brazil have been grappling this decade with
global steel overcapacity and weak prices, a strong local currency and a
domestic output glut that makes it harder to export excess production.
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