Taiwan's Feng Hsin Raises Rebar, Scrap Prices

Taiwan's Feng Hsin Steel has raised both its rebar list price and procurement price for locally sourced scrap by TWD 500/tonne ($16.5/t) on week over February 24-28 mainly to reflect better domestic steel sales and the substantial increase in global scrap price, a company official confirmed on Monday.

This has been the first round since mid-December of 2019 for Feng Hsin, Taiwan's largest rebar producer headquartered in Taichung, Central Taiwan, to increase both the prices. It had either rolled over or trimmed both prices in the previous eight rounds of pricing policies.

"The powerful rebound in steel scrap prices (in the global market) has prompted local downstream construction contractors to speed up their paces of buying when the price (for long steel) was still at a comparatively low level," Feng Hsin's official explained.

With the latest adjustment, Feng Hsin's 13mm dia rebar list price is now offered at TWD 15,300/t ex-works, up another TWD 200/t after the TWD 300/t rise on February 19, and its procurement price for locally-sourced HMS 1&2 80:20 scrap was hiked by TWD 500/t at one go on week to TWD 7,000/t, he elaborated.

As of February 24, the price of US-sourced HMS 1&2 80:20 scrap, a key reference for Taiwan's scrap and rebar markets, came in at $243/t CFR Taiwan, up substantially from its four-month low of $225/t in the previous week, and the Japan-origin H2 scrap price surged to $250/t CFR Taiwan, up $20/t on week, according to market sources in Taiwan.

Rebar demand from the downstream buyers in Taiwan has emerged with the price rise in scrap price, as well as that Taiwan has not been hit hard by the novel coronavirus disease (COVID-19), and local downstream construction sites have resumed normal operations gradually after the Chinese New Year holiday over January 23-29, according to a source from Kaohsiung, South China.

The relatively quiet market after the CNY holiday, thus, is more that "downstream buyers were waiting for rebar price to hit the bottom before buying," a Taiwan market source said.

This article has been published under an article exchange agreement between Mysteel Global & SteelMint Research