May 2011 | Welded steel tube & pipe
Stable raw materials prices maintain welded prices: Asia Market Analysis
Underlying demand for steel products in the major markets, however, could weaken steel flat product prices in Asia and force mills to make concessions on their welded pipe sales.
In general, we have witnessed a stabilization in raw materials pricing in the Asia region over the past month which has aided mills’ output and pricing decisions. Now, mills have the opportunity to make up for margin losses from the earlier volatile raw materials price movements. Japanese scrap prices, which saw sharp increases after the earthquake, are now responding to market fundamentals and settling back to pre-disaster levels. Deep-sea prices for scrap shipped to Asian customers have held in the $480/tonne CFR range since mid-April, and are vulnerable to decline as shipments to Turkey, the main competitor for material outside Asia, recently declined $10-20/tonne. After a brief spike, iron ore spot prices are now on a par with prices one month ago and are expected to move in a narrow range over the next month. While we do not expect many factors that will sharply undermine raw materials prices in...
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