Bangladesh: Imported scrap prices firm in recent trades

Imported scrap trades to Bangladesh remained average over the last week, with offers from most origins remaining mostly stable to slightly inching up on a weekly basis. Most container deals were concluded from Brazil and Australia, while a bulk cargo from Japan was also closed earlier this week amid sharply falling Japanese export offers.

SteelMint's offers for Shredded scrap from UK/Europe stands at $292-295/t CFR Chittagong, slightly up against $288-290/t levels last week. Very limited inquiries for Shredded at these levels was observed, while Brazil origin Shredded stood at $273-275/t CFR levels.

A Chittagong based mill booked a cargo from Japan at the opening of this week, consisting of 10,000 t of Japanese Busheling scrap, at a price of $287-288/t CFR Chittagong, significantly lower than their previous Japanese bookings in June. Japanese scrap export offers have fallen by over 40/t in last 3 weeks.

HMS 1&2 (80:20) offers from Brazil were reported at around $265/t CFR Chittagong, with some batches in containers booked to mills in Dhaka, at this level. Other bookings included Australian HMS 1&2 (90:10) being sold in few deals of 500-1000/t each, at around $270/t CFR, while fresh offers for Australian HMS stood at $272/t for HMS 1&2 (90:10), $267-268/t for HMS 1&2 (80:20) and $275/t and above for HMS 1. Some P&S offers were reported at around $295-300/t from Australia and Brazil.

Local ship yard scrap prices remain at around BDT 26,000/t ($ 307) ex Chittagong, inclusive of all taxes, after falling continuously last month, on account of sharp drop in prices of scrapped vessels purchased by ship recyclers in the last 3-4 weeks. Local billet prices have moved down to BDT 40,000/t ($ 471) ex plant for medium mills in Dhaka region, down BDT 1000/t w-o-w, amid continued downtrend in domestic steel market on low demand, further aggravated by monsoon slowdown.