The Turkish scrap import market moved up Thursday after a flurry of sales by European merchants.
With mills still requiring April shipments, a number of bookings were heard in the market. One was confirmed coming out of the UK a couple days ago at $377.50/mt CFR Turkey for a mixture of 20,000 mt of HMS 1/2 80:20 plus 8,000 mt of shred and 8,000 mt of bonus.
Another deal was heard originating from Estonia at $375/mt composite, including 26,000 mt of HMS 1/2 80:20 and 15,000 mt of shredded scrap. On the short sea market, a shipment from Italy was heard sold at 2,500 mt of bonus and 1,500 mt of HMS 75:25 at $367/mt CFR Iskenderun. As a result of the above cargoes Platts increased its daily assessment to $374/mt CFR Turkey.
The US again was largely quiet, with European sources stating merchants were not offering a lot as the market waits to see where domestic prices will go. There was one shipment of rail from the US heard by multiple sources at $390/mt CFR Turkey.
A US-based source said a combination of low scrap availability and Turkish requirement was forcing up the market. "The bottom line is [the Turkish mills] waited and waited for quite a while and the result was, they had to come into the market. They didn't have much of a choice and the US East Coast exporters knew that. They weren't going to take any numbers they didn't like. I don't think there are a lot of piles of scrap on the [US] East Coast."
While mills may need to buy more material, European market participants speculated that there is a limit to the price Turkish steelmakers will be willing to pay. The daily Platts assessment for rebar FOB Turkey was stable at $562/mt, unchanged for the last two weeks and, as a result, while further increases are believed possible, Platts was told $380/mt may be the limit.
