Taiwan Feng Hsin cuts rebar list price by $6.6/t, scrap bids remain unchanged

Feng Hsin Steel, Taiwan's largest rebar producer headquartered in Taichung in central Taiwan, has decided to cut its rebar list price by TWD 200/tonne ($6.6/t) on week for business discussions over April 17-21, while its buying price for locally-sourced scrap remains stable this week, a company official confirmed on Monday.

With the latest adjustment, Feng Hsin is offering its 13mm dia rebar at TWD 20,800/t for sales till this Friday, according to the official. Its procurement price for local HMS 1&2 80:20 scrap stays unchanged on week at TWD 12,100/t.

As of April 17, the price of US-sourced HMS 1&2 80:20 material remained unchanged on week at $390/CFR Taiwan after the drop during the prior week, while the price of Japan-origin H2 scrap slipped by another $10/t on week to $395/t CFR Taiwan, the lowest since late December 2022, according to a local market source.

The mini-mill decided to lower its rebar list price to facilitate sales, as local end-users were inactive in placing new orders after noting the weakness in global scrap prices. Nonetheless, Feng Hsin's production costs are still high, given the firm prices for local scrap and higher electricity costs.

Besides, finished steel prices in mainland China weakened further last week given the lackluster demand there, a factor which also aggravated the negative sentiment in Taiwan's steel market, Mysteel Global learned.

For example, the national price of HRB400E 20mm dia rebar, a bellwether of domestic steel-market sentiment under Mysteel's assessment, came in at Yuan 4,100/tonne ($597/t) including the 13% VAT as of April 14, losing by another Yuan 86/t from one week earlier.

Over April 10-14, the daily trading volume of construction steel comprising rebar, wire rod and bar-in-coil among the 237 Chinese trading houses under Mysteel's regular tracking averaged 166,870 tonnes/day, the latest data show. Though this was up 3,258 t/d from the prior week, the volume was well below the average of more than 200,000 t/d during the traditional peak season for steel consumption in April.

Written by Nancy Zheng, zhengmm@mysteel.com

Edited by Zhenqi Yang, yangzhenqi@mysteel.com

This article has been published under an article exchange agreement between Mysteel Global and SteelMint.