Posted on 01 Dec 2021
CIS hot rolled coil export trading has come to a halt, with very few offers available in the market. These are mainly directed at Turkey and the wider Middle East and North Africa, where some pockets of demand are supporting albeit lacklustre trade, market participants tell Kallanish.
Russian producers continue to enjoy buoyant domestic demand and remain out of the market, with the exception of the Baltic-shipping producer supplying northern Europe. Its offers declined to around $900-930/tonne fob, from $930-960/t fob a fortnight ago. European demand is waning towards the end of the calendar year, and pressure from competing suppliers is weighing.
Black Sea offers are largely directed at Turkey and North Africa, where demand is also lacklustre, but small sales have been made in the past week. Competition is also extremely high, weighing on prices in the region, as Asian offers remain most competitive (see separate article).
Offers to Turkey from the Ukrainian supplier have declined to $840/t cfr, or around $800-810/t fob Black Sea, depending on the tonnage, $20/t down on two weeks ago. In North Africa, Egyptian buyers booked around 10,000 tonnes of Ukrainian material at $868/t cfr, netting back to around $820-825/t fob, for January-loading tonnage.
Meanwhile, after a considerable tonnage of Russian material sold in Southeast Asia in the first half of November, no Russian offers were heard in the region at the end of November. The traditional Southeast Asia supplier trading from Russia’s eastern ports has no availability until February rolling/March loading, according to several sources.
Demand in the region was equally cold, as buyers remain on the sidelines, watching developments in China, where the futures price recovery has led some market participants to foresee a rebound in physical prices in December.
Source:Kallanish
