French stainless steel producer Aperam is increasing its February alloy surcharges for its austenitic range of flat stainless steels for Europe. The steelmaker is pushing up 304 prices by only €30/tonne ($32) month-on-month, and more significantly for other grades such as 316 where the cost of molybdenum skyrocketed in January, Kallanish notes.
Aperam’s surcharges for grade 304 (1.4301) will increase from €2,906/t in January to €2,930/t, effective 1 February. Grade 316 will hike from €4,693/t to as much as €5,012/t this month. Grade 309S, a heat-resistant stainless steel used in high-temperature applications, will go up also significantly from €3,731/t to €4,066/t. The surcharge for the most popular ferritic grade, 409, will however decrease from €851/t to €834/t, the company reveals.
Offers for nickel cash buyers meanwhile have been volatile over the past weeks. They reached $30,420/t on 30 December and fell to $29,065/t on 27 January.
Meanwhile, Aperam applied a €879/t energy surcharge to its contracts in January, down from €901/t in December. The company is expected to publish another surcharge for February in the coming days. The energy surcharge is composed of electricity, gas costs, and CO2 emission allowance costs.
The reference for the electricity costs is the “producer price index in industrial production sold in France − CPA 35.11 and 35.14 − wholesale electricity”, reported by national institute of statistics Insee.
The reference for gas costs is also provided by Insee in its “producer price index in industrial production sold in France − CPF 35.23 − wholesale of gas, on spot markets”. The carbon emission allowance cost is based on “carbon emissions futures – EUA daily future/front December futures, daily close prices” reported by ICE. The reference period for the energy composite index is the third quarter of 2021, the company reveals.
Natalia Capra France
