HRC futures opened sharply lower today and traded in the doldrums, with the most-traded contract settling at 3,261, down 0.89% intraday. Spot HRC prices fell 10-20 yuan/mt MoM, while cold-rolled coil prices dropped 10 yuan/mt. Market transactions were relatively muted, with some state-owned enterprises making purchases to fulfill previous orders.
Fundamentally, according to the SMM survey, planned commodity HRC output from 54 steel mills in October totaled 18.493 million mt, up 7.3% MoM from the actual output in September. On a daily average basis, production increased 3.9% MoM, indicating persistently high HRC supply pressure. After the holiday, end-users showed weak restocking enthusiasm amid unstable futures performance.
Overall, the US threat to impose 100% additional tariffs on Chinese imports in November has intensified trade friction. Although the impact on ferrous metals is relatively limited, short-term macro sentiment remains dominated by pessimism. Coupled with the unresolved supply-demand imbalance, the most-traded HRC futures contract is expected to continue trading in the doldrums in the near term.