Posted on 29 Jul 2025
Production of hot-rolled coils (HRC) among the 37 Chinese flat steel producers Mysteel regularly monitors slid by 1.1% or 36,500 tonnes on week to 3.17 million tonnes over July 17-23, the lowest level since May 15-21, the results of Mysteel's latest production survey show.
The hot-rolling capacity utilization rate among the 37 sampled mills also dipped by 0.93 percentage points on week to stand at 81.11% during the survey week, while their average operational rate stayed flat at 79.69%.
Continuing maintenance work on hot strip mills among steelmakers in northern China accounted for the on-week fall, Mysteel Global noted.
During the sample week, improved steel-market sentiment and rising steel-making costs, especially for that of coking coal, led HRC prices in both the spot and derivative markets to stay strong.
On July 25, China's national price of Q235 4.75mm HRC under Mysteel's assessment had jumped by Yuan 163/tonne ($22.7/t) on week to reach Yuan 3,518/t including the 13% VAT, the highest so far this year.
On the same day, the most-traded HRC futures contract on the Shanghai Futures Exchange for October delivery also rose by a large 6% on week to close the daytime trading session at Yuan 3,507/t.
However, the jump in HRC prices didn't produce any parallel spurt in urgent transactions, Mysteel data show.
As end-users' demand for hot coils remained relatively thin, stocks of the coils held by the 37 surveyed mills rose by a small 0.9% or 6,900 tonnes on week to 780,000 tonnes as of July 25.
In parallel, the tonnage held by traders at commercial warehouses in the 33 Chinese cities Mysteel checks had also edged up by 0.6% or by 15,600 tonnes during the same period to 2.67 million tonnes, the data show.
Source:Mysteel Global
