INFOGRAPHIC: Tangshan billet price hits 9.5-year high

   Square billet price in Tangshan, North China’s Hebei province, had been among the leaders in China’s domestic steel market, with the price having shot up to its 9.5-year high of Yuan 4,410/tonne as of March 2, or up a total of Yuan 560/t from February 10, the last working day before the Chinse New Year (CNY) holiday over February 11-17.
    The strengthening has been the strong proof that the market expectation on fast revival of demand from the steel end-users has materialized shortly after the CNY holiday, which has differed from the previous years that usually it took a week or two for the demand to pick up.
On top of that, Tangshan’s frequent curbing and recent intensifying in the restriction on steel operations have been adding fuel to the fire too, as both steel production and trucking have been slowed down by the control and it may not ease much during the ten-day or so “Two Sessions” in Beijing, if the past experience can be for reference.
   In the near term, the less demand from the re-rollers in Beijing may not dampening the local billet price much, as billet stocks at Tangshan’s 14 trading warehouses totalled 784,700 tonnes as of February 25, down 5.1% on year or also 13.9% lower than the same period in 2019.
Besides, high raw material costs will leave little room for billet price to ease as well.