Category: Latest Updates

Steel futures were steady on Wednesday, while iron ore prices continued to tick higher. Mills are increasingly looking to manage costs as iron ore eats into steelmaking margins.

On the Shanghai Futures Exchange the January 2021 rebar contract closed CNY 4/tonne higher than Tuesday at CNY 3,778/t ($553/t). For hot rolled coil the January contract took over from October as the most traded and closed down CNY 4/t at CNY 3,934/t. The October contract closed CNY 4/t lower at CNY 4,033/t. In Tangshan, billet prices were flat at CNY 3,460/t.

The Kallanish KORE 62% Fe index gained $0.64/t to $127.17/dry metric tonne cfr Qingdao. The Kallanish KORE 65% Fe index increased $0.56/t to $139.98/dmt cfr, and the KORE 58% Fe index was up $0.16/t to $115.90/dmt cfr.

On the Dalian Commodity Exchange January 2021 iron ore settled up CNY 4.5/t at CNY 850/t, while on the Singapore Exchange October 62% Fe futures settled up $2.39/t at $121.98/t. The same contract for 65% Fe and 58% Fe futures settled up $2.12/t at $136.58/t, and up $1.14/t at $109.73/t respectively.

Iron ore markets are still being shaped by tight inventories for key products and firm demand. Temporary production restrictions in Tangshan and elsewhere have had very little impact on mill purchasing.

With iron ore strong and steel prices increasing more slowly, margins are again becoming tighter. That is pushing mills towards cost-saving products including lower-Fe and high-grade products, which have better inventories.

ArcelorMittal is relaunching production at blast furnace no.1 in Fos-sur-Mer, southern France, Kallanish notes.

Rumours about the restart of the furnace have circulated since the company confirmed last month the restart of another BF in the north of the country, in Dunkirk.

BF1 in Fos-sur-Mer was stopped at the end of March, in response to the reduction in demand caused by the coronavirus spread in Europe. The furnace is expected to be restarted from mid-September and become fully operational in the following weeks.

Earlier this week the company also confirmed the restart of a BF in northern Spain. Most of the capacity brought back online will offset the production loss from the relining of a furnace in Ghent, Belgium.

Spain’s Network Steel will start up the continuous pickling line at its new sheet steel processing plant in Leon in the fourth quarter, part of a wider project to transform a former wind turbine factory into a 520,000 mt/year steel processing facility, the company told S&P Global Platts Sept. 1.

In the last week of August the project was started with the arrival of raw materials and 72 workers on site, a spokesman said.

Around 40,000 mt of raw materials including 25,000 mt of steel, according to press reports, have been delivered from the port of Gijon, with production of around 40,000 mt targeted from the pickling line this year.

Following the start-up of the continuous pickling line, the plant will proceed to install a cold-rolled coil line and a hot-dip galvanizing line, which are targeted to start in 2021.

By 2021, total output could reach an interim 200,000 mt/year and then 500,000 mt/year thereafter, Network Steel CEO Oscar Hetch told Leonoticias.

Madrid-based Network Steel acquired the plant, which previously belonged to Danish wind turbine maker Vestas, in 2018 and announced Eur130 million ($148 million) of refit work.

The company, founded by Hetch, started as a trader in 2002 and expanded into exporting territories in Asia, Latin America and the Mediterranean basin before diversifying into industrial activity with a galvanized coil plant in Burgos, Spain, followed by a nearby hot pickling mill for steel coil, among other businesses.

— Gianluca Baratti

Russian steelmaker Novolipietsk Steel (NLMK) has started the pre-assembly of three new finishing mill stands for the hot strip mill upgrade at its La Louvière plant in Belgium. Once the modernization of the plant is completed La Louviere’s capacity will increase to 2.2 million mt/year of hot-rolled coils, up from 1.8 million tpy. Meanwhile the 1.5 million mt/year sheet pickling line will upgrade its product capability, a company spokeswoman told S&P Global Platts on Sept. 2.

The project will enable the mill to expand production of high-strength thin hot-rolled coils and increase the range of high-strength products but also to provide customers with “best-in-class” surface tolerances.

The pre-assembly is planned to last through November, then dismantling of the old finishing mill stands will begin, followed by the installation of the pre-assembled and tested new ones. The first phase of the mill transformation is scheduled for completion by the end of 2020; the second phase will be completed in 2021.

The finishing mill stands are being supplied by Primetals Technologies, which was awarded with the Eur150 million contract in 2019.

The extensive upgrade and modernization includes the installation of a state-of-the-art automation system, three new and three upgraded roll mill stands, new drives and motors, as well as a new run-out table, modernized cooling and water systems, and a new down-coiler.

NLMK La Louvière focuses on the production of hot- and cold-rolled coils for the automotive, construction, and engineering industries. NLMK Group is the largest steelmaker in Russia and produces products used in various industries, from construction and machine building to the manufacturing of power-generation equipment and offshore wind turbines.

NLMK operates production facilities in Russia, Europe, and the US. The company’s overall steel production capacity exceeds 17 million mt/year.

— Annalisa Villa

Exports of hot rolled coil from Turkey declined again in July, keeping seven-month volumes down on-year. July dispatches were booked in April amid declining prices on low demand as Covid-19 restrictions were peaking around the world.

Turkish HRC export prices bottomed at $395/tonne ex-works in early May, before they started their current ascent, Kallanish notes.

Turkey’s exports of hot rolled flat products under HS code 7208 totalled 290,862 tonnes in July, -18.6% down on June, but 8.1% up on July 2019. January-July exports declined -15% on-year to 1.84mt, show Turkish Statistical Institute (TUIK) data. 

July shipments of the most-exported product, hot rolled strip up to 3mm thickness under HS code 720839, remained flat on-month at 121,891t, but were down -13.2% on-year. Seven-month exports declined -17.4% on-year to 707,642t.

July saw Egypt’s intake of 47,133t, the highest in the last two years, making it the top importer, followed by Italy with 23,118t, and Bulgaria and Spain with 13,774t and 13,271t, respectively. Egypt’s July intake was 20 times June volumes, and double July 2019 volumes. Italy’s intake fell by more than half on-month but was flat on-year. Bulgarian intake was flat from June and it did not import from Turkey in July 2019. Spain also kept imports flat on-month but increased intake 32% on-year.

Exports of 3-4.75mm HRC (HS code 720838) declined significantly on-month in July. At 44,504t, they were less than half of June exports and -4.6% down on-year. Italy took 12,529t, four times less than the previous month and -25.6% down on-year. Egypt’s 12,256t was an exponential increase on the 257t imported in June, and almost seven times July 2019 volumes.

Exports of 4.75-10mm strip/plate (HS code 720837) also fell considerably on-month in July, but remained stable on-year. Turkey dispatched 37,703t, nearly half of June tonnages, but 4% up on-year. Yet again, Egypt took the most, 18,312t, having not imported any in June, and scarcely any in July 2019. Belgium followed with 6,500t and Bulgaria with 5,483t.

ArcelorMittal will temporarily resume production at blast furnace A at its Gijon plant in northern Spain. The furnace was idled in April due to the fall in demand associated with the coronavirus pandemic.

Preparatory work to restart the BF will commence this week to make sure the equipment is operational by the end of September. “The decision has been taken due to the need to ensure supplies to customers during the revamping of a blast furnace at ArcelorMittal Gent in Belgium,” the company says in a note seen by Kallanish.

The restart of the furnace in Spain comes days after the company confirmed the restart of one blast furnace in northern France and the possible restart of another in the south of the country.

In addition, ArcelorMittal also confirms it will reactivate its investment project in northern of Spain that was postponed in 2019. This involves the coke-oven battery #2, the coke-oven injection of gas in BF B, and other components.

The company adds, nevertheless, that these investments could also be carried out under a single blast furnace operation, leaving the outlook unclear. “ArcelorMittal’s management maintains a cautious approach as regards a potential recovery of normal production levels, due to the uncertainty that still exists as a consequence of the economic crisis, aggravated by the impact of the Covid-19 pandemic,” the company says.

German-headquartered hot rolled and stainless bar specialist Bollinghaus Steel has opened a sales office in Milan, Italy, in a move to widen its international presence, the company said Sept. 1.

According to Bollinghaus, the location was chosen due to proximity of its customers. Italy is one of the main consumers of stainless steel in Europe. Making up 50% of usage together with Germany and France, according to the World Bureau of Metals Statistics.

Located in Hilden, Germany, Bollinghaus specializes in the distribution of stainless steel long products and has its own production facilities in Portugal.

Bollinghaus is also acting as a representative for Finnish steelmaker Outokumpu’s cold drawn hexagon and square bars in Germany and UK.

Stainless steel usage is on a rising trend in the construction, transport and other sectors where corrosion-resistance is important with Asia, particularly China, becoming a dominant region for stainless production as well as usage.

— Laura Varriale

EUROMETAL says activity at European distributors continued to be subdued in June, despite a marginal recovery compared with the low levels registered in May.

Steel service centres, for example, saw June activity drop by -16.5% year-on-year. In May the drop was twice as much, at -38.5% y-o-y. In the first six months of the year, however, the numbers indicate activity was down over -20% y-o-y, Kallanish notes.

Proximity and multi-products distributors, meanwhile, again showed more resilience. In June their activity dropped -10.2% y-o-y, bringing the total fall registered in January-June to -13.1% y-o-y.

Schmolz+Bickenbach has invited its shareholders to an extraordinary general meeting at which it will decide on a change to its nominal share value and future company name.

The maker of special bar quality steels intends to lower the nominal share price value of its stock from the current CHF 0.30 ($0.33) to CHF 0.15, Kallanish hears. It says it will allocate the amount of the nominal value reduction to reserves and to offset it to eliminate the adverse balance.

The move is one of various options to provide the company with additional financial resources. It comes in reaction to the net loss of around CHF 0.5 billion the group suffered even before the coronavirus crisis had kicked in, and the price loss its stock has suffered since.

The group also wants to change its brand name to Swiss Steel, which has so far denoted only its mill in Emmenbrücke, Switzerland. The rebranding is part of the comprehensive transformation process that the company is currently pushing forward, it says.

“It is essential that this change is also reflected in the brand and name of the company,” the group states. “A new name signals a new beginning and a clear, future-oriented positioning as a strong company with headquarters and stock exchange listing in Switzerland.”

Wuppermann Hungary has completed the €2.5 million ($3m) revamp of its hot-dip galvanizing line, thereby increasing its capacity to 750,000 tonnes/year. The move also brings productivity and quality improvements, Kallanish learns from the firm’s German parent company.

The work on the Györ plant, established in 2016, involved the extension of the air and water cooling system, the transformer and the induction unit. This significantly increased the speed and capacity of the plant, says coil processor and tubemaker Wuppermann.

“By modifying the plant, the product range of Wuppermann Hungary can now also be further developed,” the firm says. “The focus here is on the further expansion of the portfolio of zinc-magnesium coated products, as well as the extension of the high zinc coating requirements.”

In May Wuppermann Hungary started up a fully automatic packaging line for slit strips. “An integrated sorting and stacking management enables a wide variety of packaging options for the slit,” Wuppermann observes.

The Hungarian site’s previous galv capacity was 500,000 t/y. It can produce HDG in thickness of 1-6mm and width of 600-1,650mm, with coating of Z50-Z1,000.