This week, Vietnam’s HRC import market has posted some slight decline in prices and buyers have been focused on small-volume purchases of cheaper Chinese SS400 and Q195 materials. In this context, major Vietnamese mills have been actively offering HRC abroad, even though trading activity has not gained momentum yet. The leading mill in Vietnam, Formosa Ha Tinh, has also announced a further ambitious increase in local HRC offers on Friday, January 12, which has failed to support the China-dominated import market so far.
For the major export destination - the EU market - Vietnamese mills have been offering at $720/mt CFR, translating to €658/mt CFR, which is near the lower end of the range of import offers to Europe seen from last week. Also, for the UK market, an offer has been heard at $735/mt CFR. Besides Europe, Vietnamese sellers’ targeted price level to Mexico has been reported at $735/mt CFR. In the regional Southeast Asian market, producers in Vietnam have been offering to Malaysia at $655/mt CFR early this week, which was near to what they were asking in their local market, but, with the latest hike in Formosa’s local prices, these regional offers may also increase.
In the HRC import market in Vietnam, offers for SAE1006 HRC from Chinese first-tier mills have been at $605-610/mt CFR, while offers from second-tier mills have remained at $600/mt CFR. But buyers’ price ideas have slipped to $590/mt CFR, especially for traders’ position cargoes. So, the SteelOrbis reference price for SAE1006 imported HRC has lost $5-10/mt over the past week to $590-605/mt CFR. Except for China, some offers of this grade from India have been circulating at $625/mt CFR Vietnam in this week, while one cargo of 30,000 mt of SAE1006 HRC with 30 percent 2 mm material has been on offer at $635/mt CFR.
A few deals for Chinese HRC have been reported this week for cheaper SS400 and Q195 coils. In particular, the deal price level for SS400 has been at $570-575/mt CFR, down by $5-10/mt from offers reported earlier this week. Also, Q195 HRC has been sold by traders in short positions at $565-570/mt CFR. However, “nothing significant in terms of volumes has been traded so far,” a local source said.