Taiwan's CSC keeps Nov steel list prices stable

China Steel Corp (CSC), Taiwan's largest steel mill headquartered in Kaohsiung in southern Taiwan, has decided to roll over the list prices of its major steel products for local sales in November to reflect the price trend in global markets and to help its customers improve their competitiveness, according to a company release.

CSC's October 14 announcement means the steel giant in Taiwan will have kept list prices of its key steel items unchanged for a second straight month, Mysteel Global notes. The steelmaker is helping its customers to win more orders and accelerate destocking, the release explained.

"Although uncertainty in the global economy has not disappeared, steel prices internationally have shown some signs of bottoming out, supported by mills' increased steelmaking costs and the relatively reasonable levels of inventories held by users," CSC explained in the release.

The International Monetary Fund's latest forecast predicts that global economic growth will slide to 2.7% for 2023, lower than its previous forecast and indicating that the global economy will be under continued pressure going forward, CSC noted.

However, there are still some positive factors for the global steel market, the company believed. Steel supply worldwide is expected to be tight, as many steel producers in the Europe have reduced production or even halted operations completely given the surge in energy prices. Meanwhile, China continues to curb steel production, with its crude steel output for 2022 likely to be lower than last year, CSC pointed out.

Besides, China may continue to take some measures to boost economic growth, and the relaxation of COVID restrictions in many countries and regions may also accelerate business recovery abroad and promote international trade. These measures are also expected to boost the recovery in steel demand, the release stated.

Steel prices Internationally are displaying some signs of improvement, CSC explained, while the increase in steelmaking raw material prices and currency devaluations in many countries have lifted the production costs of local steel mills.

For example, steelmakers in South Korea and India have hiked their steel sales prices to reflect their higher steelmaking costs, it said, and steel prices in Europe are also reversing the downtrend.

Leading Chinese steel producer Baoshan Iron and Steel Group rolled over its list prices of carbon steel hot-rolled coil for November sales, while Ansteel Iron & Steel Group has decided to raise its November list prices of flat steel by Yuan 100/tonne ($13.9/t), according to the release.

Written by Nancy Zheng, zhengmm@mysteel.com

Note: This article has been published in accordance with an article exchange agreement between Mysteel Global and SteelMint.