Most of the world's markets for steel billet have been affected by negative sentiment after strong decreases in the prices for ferrous scrap. Buyers in China, however, were importing material while their domestic prices were rising.
Import prices of ferrous scrap in Turkey fell last week, with a
day-on-day drop of $23.90 per tonne on March 18, and further price cuts were expected.
Fastmarkets' daily index for
steel scrap, HMS 1&2 (80:20 mix), North Europe origin, cfr Turkey, was $241.63 per tonne on March 20, down by $23.90 per tonne since the preceding Monday.
The reason was a sharp decline in steel demand because of the measures being taken worldwide to control the spread of the 2019-nCoV coronavirus pandemic.
Trade was muted in most billet-buying outlets, with consumers expecting prices for the semi-finished steel material to decrease.
The price of billet produced in the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS) fell amid weak demand despite new sales to China.
But China's appetite for billet imports contrasted with the uncertainty in other markets, and was an indicator of the confidence...