Posted on 22 Apr 2026
China's total rebar output over the first quarter of 2026 declined by 12.3% on year to sit at 42.32 million tonnes, according to the latest release from the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) on April 21.
The NBS numbers show the on-year decline of cumulative rebar production widened by 3.3 percentage points from 9% in the first two months of this year, mainly due to the low output of reinforcing bar in March. NBS data in the same release indicated that the tonnage last month plummeted by 17.4% on-year to sit at 15.42 million tonnes.
During March, Chinese steel mills gradually resumed operations after the Chinese New Year (CNY) break, in expectation of a recovery in demand as the weather became warmer and construction activity would pick up accordingly. However, the profits of the makers on rebar sales remained scant and so dampened their production enthusiasm to some extent, Mysteel Global noted.
Mysteel's survey among the 91 blast-furnace steel mills it monitors nationwide showed that they still suffered from losses from selling the long steel item last month, with the average level registering Yuan 33/t ($4.8/t) in March from Yuan 30/t in February.
The worsening profit margins can be attributed to the jump in prices of steelmaking raw materials through the geopolitical tensions in the Middle East. These have raised rebar production costs which the mills tried to pass along to customers last month in the shape of higher spot rebar prices, Mysteel Global noted.
For instance, by the end of March, the Mysteel SEADEX 62% Australian Fines had jumped by $7/dmt from end-February to average $108/dmt CFR Qingdao, according to Mysteel's assessment.
In the spot market at end-March, the national price of HRB400E 20mm dia rebar was assessed by Mysteel at Yuan 3,332/t including the 13% VAT, rising by Yuan 28/t on month.
As for long product demand, the daily trading volume of construction steel comprising rebar, wire rod and bar-in-coil among the 237 trading houses sampled by Mysteel averaged 86,603 tonnes/day during March, rocketing by 148.3% on month. The huge growth was largely due to the low basis for comparison in February when this year's CNY break occurred and when most markets were closed.
On the other hand, China's finished steel output totaled 130.98 million tonnes during March, declining by 2.3% on year and taking the total volume for Q1 to 351.44 million tonnes, down by 1.7% on year, according to the NBS.
Source:Mysteel Global
