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| Chinese Inquiries Stop In Japanese Export Deals Of Sheet Piles |
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Japanese integrated steelmakers face a sudden stoppage of inquiries from China in their deals of sheet pile exports. Local users as a whole are thought to have taken a wait-and-see position on new sheet pile imports. In the background are China's domestic steel market conditions that indicate a continued fall in prices, centering on sheet products such as HR coils, the Japanese steelmakers believe. The current offer prices of sheet pile exports to China stand at around US$710/ton C&F for products from South Korea and around US$730/ton C&F for ones from Japan, according to market sources. But various customers are quoted as saying that they will opt out unless the offer prices further decline. China's sheet pile market is still viewed as around Yn7,000/ton (US$1,030), with no signs of a pronounced downturn so far. As a result, local customers could resume negotiations on new sheet pile imports once local market conditions for various steel products turn upward in prices, market observers agree. Sheet pile exports out of Japan to China totaled 122,250 tons in January-May 2010, up by a factor of more than 2.2 from the same period of 2009. The monthly export volume even topped 30,000 tons in the February-March period in particular. As a result, the Japanese steelmakers held expectations earlier for remarkable growth of sheet pile demand in China thanks to its government's enhanced infrastructure projects. The Japanese steelmakers find themselves in a virtual stoppage of negotiations on their deals of sheet pile exports to destinations other than China. But it is unlikely that suspensions of local construction will last for an indefinite period because many of the suspended cases relate to public works projects. As a result, the Japanese steelmakers expect to get increased sheet pile inquiries from destinations other than China around September, if not in the July-August period. |
| last modified : Mon 12 Jul, 2010 [11:11] |
