The European spot ferro-silicon market, which has been falling since March, appears to have found a floor due to near-term supply worries with production cuts and reduced export offers into Europe supporting offer prices, trade sources told Fastmarkets.
The market, currently at a price last achieved in March 2016, plunged after consumers in the steel sector brought the cost of the feedstock down against a slump in end-user consumption, Fastmarkets understands.
Steel mills tend to use ferro-silicon and ferro-manganese together in flat steel production, which is used in car manufacture, while ferro-silicon is used in wire rod production and is mostly for tyre cord production, which uses more specialty alloy grades, Fastmarkets understands.
Consequently, steelmakers in Europe had to cut their production rates earlier in the year before cutting them even further due to the seasonal summer slowdown, which was extended to five weeks from two weeks this year due to extraordinary falls in consumption amid the Covid-19 pandemic, sources said.
These factors then prompted cuts in ferro-silicon production, with...