Posted on 04 Aug 2025
After the recovery seen the previous week, rebar production among the 137 Chinese steel mills Mysteel tracks nationwide declined during July 24-30, dipping by a small 0.4% or 9,000 tonnes from the previous week to hover around 2.11 million tonnes, according to the latest weekly survey. This result was 6.7% higher than during the same week last year though, the data show.
Survey respondents attributed the on-week fall in rebar output to some mills in North China's Heilongjiang and Southwest China's Sichuan observing short-term maintenance stoppages or rescheduling production. However, rebar output at a few mills in Central China's Hubei and Southeast China's Jiangxi climbed during the survey week after they had resumed operations or had allocated more hot metal to rebar production.
During the survey period, the rebar rolling capacity utilization rate among the surveyed makers slipped by 0.2 percentage point on week to 46.3%, while their operational rate stayed unchanged on week at 43.9%, Mysteel's survey found.
Meanwhile, lower output saw rebar stocks at the surveyed mills thin by 2.1% or 35,200 tonnes on week to reach a six-month low of 1.62 million tonnes as of July 31.
In contrast, the rebar tonnage being held by the traders Mysteel monitors in 35 cities nationwide mounted by 3% or 111,700 tonnes on week to 3.84 million tonnes by Thursday, a 1.5-month high. The sluggish seasonal demand from building contractors was cited as the main reason.
Over July 25-31, Mysteel's survey among the 237 Chinese steel traders it tracks across the country showed that their trading volume of rebar, wire rod and bar-in-coil shrank by 9% or 9,936 tonnes/day on week to average 100,175 t/d.
Further dampening construction activity was Typhoon Co-may, which made landfall along China's eastern coast on Wednesday, bringing torrential rains and strong winds to Shanghai, Zhejiang and Jiangsu, as reported.
"The market has cooled recently, as the signals from the Politburo meeting on Wednesday were largely within expectations and news of major additional stimulus plans was lacking," commented a Shanghai-based analyst. He added that this had disappointed the market, causing sentiment to weaken and undermining domestic steel prices.
As of July 31, China's national price of HRB400E 20mm dia rebar, for example, had softened by some Yuan 56/tonne ($7.8/t) on day to Yuan 3,407/t and including the 13% VAT, according to Mysteel's assessment. On a weekly basis, this price was also down Yuan 34/t from that on July 24.
Source:Mysteel Global
