Posted on 16 Aug 2022
Vietnamese producer Formosa Ha Tinh Steel (FHS) has reduced domestic prices for its new allocations of hot rolled coil and wire rod amid a sluggish market, Kallanish notes.
FHS announced that the October shipment price of its non-skin-passed SAE 1006 hot rolled coil prices will be at the equivalent of $610/tonne cfr Ho Chi Minh City, a decrease of $45/t, sources in the company confirmed on 15 August. Like before, the mill’s SS400 grade HRC price is the same as for SAE 1006 grade.
The announced strip prices are lower than expected, a Hanoi trader says on Monday. But a Ho Chi Minh trader thinks that it is “reasonable at this time because Taiwanese, Japanese and South Korean (strip) prices have decreased to low levels. Demand in the third-quarter is very weak.”
While he notes that the market is hoping for a recovery in the fourth quarter, there are no positive signs so far. Prices for HRC from these origins in Northeast East Asia have been heard at $610-620/t cfr Vietnam in recent weeks. Market participants have also reported that Vietnamese rerollers have been delaying the arrivals of outstanding contracts of HRC from Formosa due to slow off-take.
Formosa also announced a $77/t cut in its mesh quality wire rod domestic price for October shipments to the equivalent of $631/t cfr.
Source:Kallanish
