Iran: Billets export market inactive; domestic trade gains

The Iranian* billets exports market continued to remain quiet amid the ongoing China Golden Week holidays. Market participants are waiting for Chinese buyers to return to get the clarity about market. However, no export deal has been concluded so far this week.

Khouzestan Steel Company (KSC), Iran's leading steel exporter, has floated an export tender for 40,000 t of steel billets recently this week. The shipment is likely to be scheduled for mid-Nov'21. According to data maintained with SteelMint, the company's previous export tender was concluded at $635/t on FOB basis in the third week of Sep.

According to data maintained with SteelMint, the Chinese rebar futures contract for Jan'22 delivery closed at RMB 5,706/t ($883/t) on 30 Sept'21, a w-o-w increase of RMB 101/t ($16/t).

Improve domestic billet trade on IME: Domestic billet sales on the Iran Mercantile Exchange (IME) increased sharply by around 73% w-o-w with 3% hike in the average price. Around 87,760 t of billets were traded in the last one week at an average sales price of 129,319 Rial on IME, as per data maintained by SteelMint.

Last week, around 50,725 t of billets were traded at an average sales price of 125,873 Rial on the IME.

On the back of closing export trade from Iran amid week long Chinese holidays, domestic billet trade on IME has been increased sharply.

Semi-finished producers from Iran prefer to wait and see, and expected a better demand closer to the middle of the October post business activity resume in China, the Iranian export market nowadays, remains slow due to the holidays.

* changed to Iranian as it was mistakenly written as Indian