Taiwan's Feng Hsin lowers rebar, scrap prices

Feng Hsin Steel, Taiwan's largest rebar producer headquartered in Taichung in central Taiwan, has decided to cut its rebar list prices and procurement prices for locally-sourced scrap for transactions over June 20-24, mainly to reflect the drop in global scrap prices and weak demand from local steel buyers, a company official confirmed on Tuesday. Previously, the company had rolled over its product prices for four consecutive weeks, Mysteel Global notes.

With the latest adjustments, the mini-mill is offering its 13mm dia rebar at TWD 22,600/tonne ($762/t) EXW for business discussions till this Friday, down TWD 700/t from the previous week, according to the official. Its buying price for local HMS 1&2 80:20 scrap has been lowered to TWD 12,400/t, down another TWD 300/t this week after the decrease of TWD 300/t on June 17.

One major reason for Feng Hsin's scrap-price cut was the significant decrease in global scrap prices, Mysteel Global learned.

As of June 20, the price of US-sourced HMS 1&2 80:20 scrap was reported at $420/t CFR Taiwan, falling by $20/t on week after the short-lived recovery over the prior week and marking the lowest since mid-April 2021. Also as of Monday, the price of Japan-origin H2 scrap had posted a sharper on-week fall of $25/t to reach $440/t CFR Taiwan, according to a local market source.

In addition, prices of other steelmaking raw materials such as iron ore have also declined significantly recently, aggravating the negative sentiment in Taiwan's steel market as the prices of square billet, a key input, have dropped accordingly, Mysteel Global noted.

For example, as of June 20 the Mysteel SEADEX 62% Australian Fines iron ore index had declined for the eighth working day to a six-month low of $112/dmt CFR Qingdao, slumping by $23.95/dmt from one week before, according to Mysteel's data.

Feng Hsin's rebar list prices saw a larger decrease this week in the quiet market, as local end-users are preferring to wait and see after noting the weakness in ferrous markets generally, Mysteel Global was told.

Written by Nancy Zheng, zhengmm@mysteel.com
This article has been published in accordance with an article exchange agreement between Mysteel Global and SteelMint.