Feng Hsin Steel, Taiwan’s largest rebar producer, has decided to keep its rebar list prices and buying price for locally-sourced scrap unchanged over August 17-21, given the dull environment for rebar sales and stable scrap prices in Taiwan, a company official confirmed on Monday. The company has now rolled over both prices for two straight weeks.
For business till this Friday therefore, the mini-mill headquartered in Kaohsiung in south Taiwan, continues to offer its 13mm dia rebar at TWD 15,000/tonne ($511/t) EXW, while its procurement price for local HMS 1&2 80:20 scrap remains at TWD 7,300/t, according to the official.
As of August 17, the price of US-sourced HMS 1&2 80:20 scrap in Taiwan had risen for the sixth consecutive week, climbing by another $10/t on week to reach $262/t CFR Taiwan, the highest since late January, a market source there said. Meanwhile, the steady gain in the price of Japanese H2 scrap has also seen that price reach a one-year high of $280/t CFR Taiwan, thanks to the large week-on-week increase of 13/t.
Although growth in the international scrap market continued over the past week, scrap prices in Taiwan remained stable due to sufficient supplies of material, Mysteel Global learned.
“Scrap traders in Taiwan are very active in making deliveries, perhaps because they are not so confident about the (scrap) market in the near term,” Feng Hsin’s official observed. Therefore, the mini-mill is in no hurry to follow the hike in global scrap prices as it can get enough scrap deliveries without offering any mark-up incentive to collectors and dealers.
At the same time, rebar sales in Taiwan slowed down last week. Many downstream users adopted a wait-and-see approach given the uncertainties in the global scrap market, Mysteel Global was told.
However, scrap traders in Japan are still confident about their prices, considering the lower scrap stocks at domestic mini-mills and the slow scrap generation during the Japanese summer Obon season, despite prices for both domestic sales and exports having taken a pause over August 10-14 because of public holidays, according to a market source in Japan.
This article has been published under an article exchange agreement between Mysteel Global and SteelMint Research.
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