Posted on 22 Dec 2020
Approaching the new year, market participants remain quite bullish over US domestic scrap prices in January trading.
While price increases continue unabated in export markets, US mills’ demand for scrap is also strong. Coupled with the imbalance between scrap supply and demand, and harsh winter conditions, the outlook for scrap prices remains firm in the US domestic market. Most market participants expect to see rises in scrap prices starting from $50/tonne, depending on the grade.
On the West Coast, containerised US-origin HMS 80:20 further gained in Taiwan last week amid limited availability of offers. Prices, which stood at $380/t cfr the previous week, increased last week to $428-430/t cfr, Kallanish notes.
On the East Coast, US suppliers continued to stay out of the Turkish market while selling more cargoes to the Latin American market last week. On 21 December, however, a US-origin scrap sale was heard in Turkish market after five weeks of absence. A Turkish mill is heard to have bought US- origin HMS 80:20 at $464/t cfr Turkey. The previous US-origin HMS 80:20 booking appeared at $306.5/t cfr five weeks ago.
A Turkish mill inquiring about scrap says US suppliers are now offering HMS 80:20 at $480/t cfr, though offers are still limited.
Late on Monday another mill, in northern Turkey, is confirmed to have booked an ex-Denmark scrap cargo at $476/t cfr average for 12,000 tonnes of HMS 80:20, 6,000t of P&S and 5,000t of busheling.
As a result of the strength of the global scrap market and with the support of iron ore prices, market participants now see US-origin scrap prices moving closer to the $500/t cfr Turkey threshold.
Source:Kallanish
