Posted on 24 Nov 2023
Chinese steel traders saw their finished steel stocks at hand decline further over November 17-23, thinning by another 316,500 tonnes on week, as against the 284,000 tonnes on-week drop in the prior period, Mysteel's latest survey results show. Long steel consumption in northern regions had slowed while demand for flat steel nationwide had stayed firm, sources said.
Inventories of the five major finished steel products in traders' warehouses in the 132 cities Mysteel monitors fell for the seventh successive week, losing another 2.1% on week to total 15.1 million tonnes as of November 23, the latest data showed. The five products comprise rebar, wire rod, hot-rolled coil (HRC), cold-rolled coil and medium plate.
Among the five, HRC and rebar witnessed comparatively sharper declines in stocks, with those of the former shedding 118,600 tonnes on week to nearly 4 million tonnes by Thursday, and the latter decreasing by 108,600 tonnes during the same period to 5.4 million tonnes.
A Shanghai-based industry watcher pointed out that generally, the country's long steel demand remained resilient even though actual demand from end-users in northern China had been impacted by temperature drops and strong winds. On the other hand, flat steel demand was largely firm as the market has been less affected by the winter weather.
His opinion was in line with Mysteel's survey among the 237 traders it tracks throughout the country, which showed that their trading volume of rebar, wire rod and bar-in-coil recovered by 2.7% on week to average 154,123 tonnes/day over November 16-22.
Meanwhile, steel inventories held by traders in Mysteel's former smaller sample across just 35 cities also shrunk for the seventh week in a row, down 2.8% or 258,700 tonnes on week to 8.97 million tonnes as of November 23, compared with the 255,400 tonnes-decline in the previous week.
Source:Mysteel Global
