European domestic rebar prices continued climbing in the week to Wednesday, February 4, supported by growing production costs, particularly for scrap and energy, market participants told Fastmarkets.
Sources said there was a growing need for steel scrap in the EU due to a slowdown of steel imports following the implementation of the Carbon Border Adjustment Mechanism (CBAM) at the start of the year.
The reduction in steel billet and long steel import volumes has resulted in a higher reliance on domestic supplies, the sources said, which increased the demand for scrap to feed Europe’s electric-arc furnace based long steel industry.
Scrap collections in Europe have fallen recently, however, due to seasonal factors and more severe weather in some regions.
“An acute scrap shortage is emerging in Europe,” a local long steel producer told Fastmarkets.
And a producer from Northern Europe reported a February price increase of €20 per tonne for old scrap and €15 per tonne for new scrap compared with January.
A source from Italy, meanwhile, said that scrap prices there had increased by more than €20 per tonne over the past two months, while energy costs were about 15% higher than mill forecasts for January.
Because of these conditions, mills across Europe have attempted price rises, which are gradually being accepted by customers.
In Italy fresh offers of 8-40 mm rebar were heard in a wide range at €595-640 per tonne ex-works, depending on the mill and the region, sources said, with the lower-end prices traditionally said to be representative of northern Italy, while the upper end represented the situation in southern parts of the country.
Sales prices were also said to be within rather wide range, depending on the mill, the region and the size of cargo.
In the northern Italy, sales were said to have been done mostly around €580-610 per tonne ex-works, sources said.
In southern Italy, deals were heard at up to €640 per tonne ex-works, sources said, adding that this level had not been widely accepted – resulting in a situation that a local trading source described at “a big chaos”.
Fastmarkets’ weekly price assessment for steel reinforcing bar (rebar) domestic, exw Italy was €580-630 per tonne ex-works on Wednesday, narrowing from €560-590 per tonne on January 28. The average was €605 per tonne.
Concerns were growing among market participants that market leader Pittini’s 400,000 tonnes per year rebar mill at its Verona site, would affect prices in the near term.
Spanish mills followed similar trend to those in Italy and increased their effective rebar offers to around €680 per tonne delivered, with some smaller deals reportedly taking place at this level, while that level was said to be unworkable for bigger tonnages.
Fastmarkets’ weekly price assessment for steel reinforcing bar (rebar) domestic, delivered Spain spread to €665-680 per tonne on February 4, from €665 per tonne delivered on January 28.
“The Spanish are less active in France, we have noticed, and also the economic indicators there are better,” a supplier from Northern Europe said,discussin gthe reasons for the comparatively high price levels in Spain.
In Northern Europe, meanwhile, and in Germany and the Benelux areas in particular, rebar offers varied in the range of €630-640 per tonne delivered.
Workable prices were estimated at €610-640 per tonne delivered.
Fastmarkets’ weekly price assessment for steel reinforcing bar (rebar) domestic, delivered Northern Europe widened up to €610-640 per tonne on Wednesday, compared with €610-620 per tonne on January 28.
