Sichuan Desheng to undertake rolling line maintenance for 8 days

China steel rebar inventories continued to accelerate increases this week.

Social inventories of long steel (including wire rods and rebar) in Guangzhou decreased 0.56%, or 7,400 mt, in the week ended August 12 to 1.31 million mt, showed SMM data. The stocks were 50.75% higher than the same period last year.

Social inventories of long steel (including wire rods and rebar) in Guangzhou decreased 3.84%, or 52,600 mt on week but surged 40.98% on year to 1.32 million mt as of August 5, showed SMM data.

That marked the fifth consecutive week of decline, driven by the release of pent-up demand after the rainy season. However, the slide slowed down from a drop of 5.86%, or 86,100 mt, in the previous week, as production from EAF steel mills rebounded and an escalation in US-China relations weighed on market sentiment and depressed speculative demand. 

That marked the third consecutive week of decline in Guangzhou inventories as downstream demand improved as the market has roughly shrugged off the impact of the rainy season.

Planned output of construction steel rebar across China’s major blast furnace steelmakers in July decreased as expected, by 2% from the realised production in June to 9.07 million mt, showed an SMM survey.

Most steelmakers in China continued to maintain full operations and the impact of maintenance on output will further reduce from a month ago in June, driven by existing profits of rebar.

Output of cold-rolled steel (including galvanised steel) at Benxi Iron & Steel is expected to reduce 158,000 mt in May as the steelmaker plans to put a cold rolling mill into maintenance this month, sources told SMM. 

Planned output of construction steel rebar across China’s major blast furnace steelmakers in May rose 15.24% from the planned production in April to 9.16 million mt,  on the back of steelmakers return from maintenance and diverted capacity to rebar in the chase of higher profits, showed an SMM survey.

Chinese electric arc furnace (EAF) steelmakers operating rates continued to edge higher as of early May, driven by the resumption of producers in central China as the spread of the coronavirus has stalled. However, the rally in operations will be constrained due to a surge in feedstock steel scrap prices.