After the stimulus efforts, there has been a slight improvement in consumption, but it falls short of market expectations. Overall, the demand remains weak, putting pressure on prices to increase. This is the main factor causing a continued decline in items such as HRC, construction steel, pipes, boxes, and sheets. While billets and scrap metal have some price momentum, traders still face difficulties in adjusting their prices upward. Additionally, the Chinese market has not shown signs of hitting bottom, which also affects the Vietnamese market. Therefore, in the near future, steel prices may undergo further adjustments.

Import scrap market:

The Kanto auction session in May 2023 saw a deeper decline than projected, and the offer price for Japanese H2 scrap to Vietnam continued to decrease slightly. Buyers are still cautious in the market, but some transactions have been recorded this week.

Domestic scrap market:

The shortage of supply in the domestic scrap market remains common. However, there is inconsistency as prices slightly increase in the North while they continue to decrease in the South.

Import - export billet market:

The Southeast Asian import market showed mixed trends this week, with traders slightly increasing their offers while mills continued to decrease their prices. As a result, there were no significant fluctuations in Vietnam's export billet prices. The import billet prices to Vietnam decreased slightly, but no transactions have been recorded yet.

Domestic billet market:

There was some improvement in billet prices this week as more transactions took place, but the price only increased slightly by 1.66%. Moreover, the price shows no signs of stable growth due to the unfavorable conditions in the scrap and construction steel markets.

Import HRC market:

The import HRC market only received offers from China with continuously decreasing prices. The reason is the rapid decline in futures prices at the end of the week, along with major Chinese mills lowering their HRC prices. However, the market has not recorded any transactions due to weak demand.

Domestic HRC market:

Domestic consumption showed some signs of recovery but not as expected, as the demand still remains weak. The decline in futures prices led to a clearer decrease in HRC prices this week, around 3.3%, but the extent of the decrease varies among traders.

Export construction steel market:

Affected by the Chinese market, but mainly due to weak demand, construction steel prices in Southeast Asia continue to slide, and Vietnam's prices are not immune to this downward trend.

Domestic construction steel market:

Steel mills have reduced construction steel prices for the second time this month, marking the sixth consecutive decrease since April 2023, and there are no signs of the decline stopping yet, although the pace of decrease is slowing down. In terms of consumption, there has been a slight improvement, but it is not enough to support market stability and a rebound.

Pipe and box steel market:

With the decrease in input HRC prices, the pressure to reduce prices on pipe and box steel is greater. Some mills continued to decrease prices slightly this week, and traders also adjusted down by 0.8% compared to the previous week.

Corrugated iron market:

Compared to the previous week, sheet steel prices continued to decline by 0.8%. While unofficially, mills have not reduced prices, they still adjust downward due to pressure from HRC and slow consumption.

Source: Giathepton