Chinese BF mills' production dips for 2nd week

With more mills starting overhaul on furnaces amid tepid downstream demand, hot metal production among Chinese blast furnace (BF) steel producers continued falling for the second straight week, though the declining pace slowed, Mysteel's latest survey showed.

Over 28 June-4 July, the BF capacity utilisation rates of the 247 Chinese steelmakers under Mysteel's regular tracking averaged 89.08%, losing 0.05 percentage point from the prior week. Their daily average hot metal production then dipped 1,200 tonnes (t)/day on week to reach 2.39 mnt/d, slowing from the 5,000 t/d drop seen in the previous week.

During the same period, the average operational rate among these sampled mills also fell 0.3 percentage point from the previous week to 82.81%, the survey showed.

Steelmakers further reined in their output after seeing the retreat in steel consumption by end-users, market sources observed.

Mysteel's other survey showed that the total inventories of the five major carbon steel products piled at domestic traders' warehouses continued rising for the fifth straight week by Thursday, even though the total production of these five products declined overall.

In parallel with the decrease in hot metal output, the daily consumption of imported iron ore among the 247 steel mills Mysteel tracks nudged down for the second consecutive week, albeit by a marginal 200 t/d on week, to average 2.9 mnt/d over 28 June-4 July.

As of 4 July, the total stocks of imported iron ore held by the same 247 mills increased by 727,800 t or 0.8% on week to reach 92.1 mnt, which would be sufficient to last them for 31.4 days at their current use rate, Mysteel assessed.

The rebound in steel prices this week helped some steel mills restore their profit margins, and they were more willing to replenish their feed stocks, Mysteel Global learned.

By Thursday, around 45% of the 247 BF mills under Myteel's tracking could earn some profits on their steel sales, higher by some 2 percentage points on week.

Note: This article has been written in accordance with an article exchange agreement between MySteel Global and BigMint.