Prices in most of the global markets for steel billet softened in the week ended Friday August 23 amid poor demand and falling raw materials prices.
Fastmarkets’ daily index for iron ore 62% Fe fines, cfr Qingdao, was $87.81 per tonne on Friday, down by $1.76 per tonne week on week.
Meanwhile, Fastmarkets’ daily index for steel scrap, HMS 1&2 (80:20 mix), North Europe origin, cfr Turkey, was $274.14 per tonne on August 23, down by $3.84 per tonne from the previous week.
China and Turkey are the largest buyers of iron ore and scrap respectively, so their prices are indicative of the global market.
Turkey
Turkish billet prices went down last week because of the sluggish demand and the downturn in imported scrap prices, sources told Fastmarkets.
Domestic long steel producer Kardemir, in the Karabük region, opened its domestic billet sales on August 20 at around $412-418 per tonne ex-works and sold around 58,000 tonnes on the day. This was a $2-8 per tonne drop week on week.
In such market conditions, buyers in Turkey were seeking prices of less than…