Stocks of the five major finished steel products at the 184 Chinese steel mills sampled under Mysteel’s weekly survey declined to an 8.5-month low of 5.49 million tonnes over September 16-22, mainly due to the reduction in output from the tough restrictions imposed on energy consumption among Chinese steel mills.
Total inventories of the five major steel products comprising rebar, wire rod, hot-rolled coil, cold-rolled coil and medium plate slipped for the fifth consecutive week over September 16-22, seeing a sharper decrease of 6% on week against the prior on-week fall of 2%.
Among the total, stocks of rebar and wire rod posted the largest declines in volume with the drop in production, down 269,900 tonnes and 80,700 tonnes respectively on week, the survey showed.
Over September 16-22, total output of the five major steel products among the 184 surveyed mills slid for the third week to 9.2 million tonnes, dropping by 6.2% on week and hitting the lowest since April 2020. Production of rebar slipped by 361,800 tonnes on week during the period, accounting for nearly 60% of the total decrease of the five steel items.
“About 70% of the rebar rolling lines in Jiangsu (in East China) have been suspended due to the power-use curbs, and some other rebar mills are not operating at full capacity,” a market watcher in Shanghai said.
China’s domestic steel prices, especially those of long steel items, have grown steadily as market sentiment improved with the substantial fall in steel production. As of September 22, the national price of HRB400E 20mm dia rebar touched a four-month high of Yuan 5,754/tonne ($889/t) including the 13% VAT, gaining another Yuan 197/t on week, according to Mysteel’s data.
The spot trading volume of construction steel comprising rebar, wire rod and bar-in-coil among the 237 traders Mysteel monitors increased over September 16-22 to 229,835 tonnes/day on average, reversing up by a substantial 23,932 t/d or 11.6% on week after the retreat over the prior week.
Inventories of the five steel items at the commercial warehouses Mysteel monitors in 132 cities declined further for the eighth week over September 17-23, easing by another 2% on week to a three-month low of 21.7 million tonnes, the survey showed.
Written by Nancy Zheng, zhengmm@mysteel.com
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