Markets in Asia

摘要

The year of the Golden Pig promises to be a prosperous one for Asian steel suppliers. Rising demand is maintaining pressure on supply, prices have continued to rise in China and higher prices have spread around east and south-east Asia. Tighter monetary conditions imposed by the Chinese government to cool the economy may have slowed the rate of growth in demand but have not damped down the price recovery. However, as indicated in the February Steel Markets Monthly, China's big steelmakers, led by Baoshan Iron & Steel, remain cautious on pricing. In coil markets they have not tried to force prices higher but rather matched recent spot market movements with moderate increases of Rmb100-300/tonne (13-38 dollars/tonne) for second-quarter deliveries, and have even left some first-quarter prices unchanged. In fact, Baoshan has not raised the price of HR coil for general structural applications, but other grades will go up by Rmb200/tonne (25 dollars/tonne), taking prices for higher grades to Rmb3,940-3,945/tonne (508-509 dollars/tonne). Prices of pickled and oiled coil, CR coil and electrolytic galvanised coil prices will all rise by Rmb300/tonne(38 dollars/tonne), but for ordinary HDG the increase is only Rmb200/tonne (25 dollars/tonne), to RMB5,425-5,430/tonne(700 dollars/tonne).