[view of SMM Iron and Steel Morning meeting on July 31st] supply and demand are increasing, and steel prices are under pressure and support.

Published: Jul 31, 2020 09:28 (GMT+8)

Iron ore: 30 days even iron high down, the port spot market early quotation basically maintained stability. Afternoon trading was strong, and some traders raised their quotations, and the turnover was lower than in the morning. Shandong and Tangshan PB powder traded 843-850 yuan, the price is up and down from yesterday. In view of the fact that the port inventory is expected to continue to accumulate in the near future, the problem of tight powder ore in the mainstream is expected to ease slightly. It is understood that in view of the recent rapid rise in the price of medium-grade ore, some steel mills in East China and North China have replaced part of the medium-grade ore with a mixture of imported fine powder and low-grade ore. High-quality card powder recently due to a large decline in prices, transactions slightly improved, it is expected that the price gap between high and middle products will continue to narrow space or more limited. In addition, according to SMM data, the recent port spot market PB powder price gap narrowed to about 20 yuan / ton, lump ore performance-price ratio continues to improve, superimposed recent coke prices have been reduced by about 150 yuan / ton compared with early July, some steel mills along the Yangtze River have increased demand for lump ore. Rebar: spot prices are suppressed and supported. On the one hand, the supply side is steadily increasing. According to SMM research, as of July 28, the operating rate of electric arc furnaces in East China increased by 4% month-on-month compared with last week. At the same time, inventories are high, and the social coffers of mainstream cities in eastern China are much higher than last year. Hangzhou inventory is more than 1 million tons for a long time. Among them, a large number of spot lock resources have become a hidden danger that can not be ignored in the process of price rise, which plays a continuous role in suppressing spot prices. On the other hand, demand is continuing to recover. According to the research data of SMM, about 38% of the terminal enterprises are expected to increase their steel purchases in August. Coupled with the strong price of raw materials caused by the willingness of steel mills to continue to strengthen, there is still support at the bottom of steel prices. Hot coil: this week, the total stock of hot-rolled coil is 3.8831 million tons, with a month-to-month ratio of + 0.72% and + 12% compared with the same period last year. The overall growth rate has slowed down from the previous month, and the year-on-year growth rate has also declined. Recently, the accumulation speed of hot rolls is relatively slow. Steel mills almost no inventory pressure, strong willingness to raise prices. The short-term inventory pressure in the market is not obvious, but due to the continuous suppression of terminal demand, the willingness to raise prices is weaker than in the previous period, and some merchants with high inventory are mainly shipping, which leads to the weakness of the current spot prices. However, it is worth noting that the fundamentals of the short-term hot volume spot market are OK, and the bottom of the stack is supported by raw materials, so it is expected that even if the rise is weak, a deep pullback is also more difficult in the short term, probably maintaining a volatile weak pattern.

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