HRC prices in Europe hold steady; buyers assess market conditions

Prices for steel hot-rolled coil in Europe remained largely stable on Wednesday January 15, with buyers mainly in “wait-and-see” mode while they assess current market conditions, industry sources have told Fastmarkets.

Mills in Northern Europe have improved their order books, which allowed them to maintain comparatively high offers for the first quarter of 2025, Fastmarkets understands.

Offers of HRC with delivery in March were heard at €570-620 ($585-637) per tonne ex-works, with the lower end of the price range not widely available in the market.

According to industry sources, some producers were even fully booked for the first quarter of the year, and offers for the next quarter were heard at €620-630 per tonne ex-works.

But the targeted prices of producers at levels of €600 per tonne and higher have not been sealed in deals yet, Fastmarkets understands.

“The market is currently a bit boring. Buyers are mainly in a ‘wait-and-see’ mode,” a distributor source based in Germany told Fastmarkets.

The source added that buyers’ warehouses had sufficient volumes of the material, and currently, there was no restocking.

The distributor was also not optimistic about future market developments.

“There are no positive signs so far from the main steel-consuming sectors, such as automotive and construction,” the source added.

Levels significantly higher than €570 per tonne ex-works were considered not workable according to industry sources.

Fastmarkets calculated its daily steel hot-rolled coil index, domestic, exw Northern Europe at €572.79 per tonne on Wednesday, down by just €0.54 per tonne from €573.33 per tonne on Tuesday.

The index was up by €6.54 per tonne week on week and by €10.29 per tonne month on month.

Meanwhile, in Southern Europe, Fastmarkets calculated its corresponding daily steel hot-rolled coil index, domestic, exw Italy at €570.00 per tonne on Wednesday, unchanged from the previous calculation on Tuesday.

The index was also up by €7.50 per tonne week on week and by €8.50 per tonne month on month.

Offers of March-delivery HRC were heard in Italy at €610-620 per tonne delivered, which would net back to €600-610 per tonne ex-works, Fastmarkets understands.

But due to a mismatch between seller and buyer views on the prices, no major deals were heard in the market.

“Buyers have been bidding at €560-580 per tonne ex-works, but without success,” a buyer source based in Italy told Fastmarkets.

The market for imported HRC also remained quiet.

A second buyer source told Fastmarkets that there was no interest in such material due to the anti-dumping investigation against HRC from Egypt, India, Japan, and Vietnam and the new steel safeguard measures review of the European Commission.

Turkey was heard offering HRC at €590-610 per tonne CFR Italy, including the anti-dumping duty.

HRC from Indonesia was on offer to Italy at €550-560 per tonne CFR.

But buyers’ estimations for the workable market level of imported HRC were lower at €530-550 per tonne CFR, and no major deals were heard in the market.

Published by: Darina Kahramanova