Demand for Finished Steel Kept Climbing amid Mixture of Bulls and Bears

SHANGHAI, Mar 7 (SMM) - Domestic spot prices of rebar rose before falling last week as the terminal demand continued to recover slowly. Coupled with the on-going “Two Sessions” (China’s annual parliamentary meeting), the market sentiments improved, driving up the speculative demand. The overall demand for rebar is expected to increase slightly this week. In terms of HRC, the coil prices weakened before rising last week as the market trading atmosphere cooled down slightly and the overall demand fluctuated within a narrow range. In detail, the demand in south, central and north-east China was slightly better than that in east and north China. Looking at the follow-up stage, driven by favourable macro front and resilient downstream industries such as infrastructure and automobiles, SMM believes that the demand for HRC in the medium term will be relatively strong.