Daily crude steel output among the member mills of the China Iron and Steel Association (CISA) climbed further during January 11-20, rising by another 3.7% or 74,700 tonnes/day from the previous ten days to 2.09 million t/d on average, according to the association’s new release on Tuesday.
The mid-January daily average was also higher by some 8.1% on year, CISA notes.
Contributing to the continuous rise in daily output was the fact that many domestic steel mills had been maintaining steady operations after bringing blast furnaces back online from maintenance, sources remarked.
In addition, based on the performance of its member mills, CISA estimated that the country’s daily crude steel output averaged 2.73 million t/d during mid-January, higher by 2.8% from January 1-10.
Meanwhile, finished steel inventories held by CISA’s member mills had risen further as of January 20, with the total volume up 6.7% or 960,000 tonnes from January 10 at 15.4 million tonnes, the CISA data showed. The ongoing slack steel consumption season was blamed, Mysteel Global notes.
China’s finished steel prices had also been volatile during mid-January. As of January 19, the country’s national price of HRB400E 20mm dia rebar, for example, was assessed by Mysteel at Yuan 4,024/tonne ($562/t) and including the 13% VAT, lower by Yuan 15/t from that on January 10.
That demand among steel end-users was low was also suggested by the results of Mysteel’s latest survey on the spot sales of rebar, wire rod and bar-in-coil among the 237 Chinese trading houses it regularly monitors. These showed that for mid-January, their daily trading volume had weakened further by 11.6% or 15,046 t/d from the average during the first ten days of January to average 114,419 t/d.
