China Steel Corp (中鋼) is likely to raise domestic steel prices for March shipments today because of strong demand from downstream customers, after the nation’s biggest steelmaker twice reduced prices for December-February delivery.
“China Steel will probably raise all product prices for the first time in three months to reflect rising raw material costs and strong downstream demand,” an analyst at Capital Securities Corp (群益證券) said by telephone yesterday.
The analyst, who wished to remain anonymous, said the company might raise prices by an average NT$800 to NT$1,000 (US$25 to US$31.50) a tonne for March delivery, after reducing them by an average NT$280 per tonne for January-February shipments from December delivery.
The Kaohsiung-based company is scheduled to announce domestic steel prices today after the stock market closes.
Shares of China Steel fell 0.73 percent at NT$34.15 on the Taiwan Stock Exchange yesterday, compared with the benchmark TAIEX’s decline of 1.07 percent.
Last week, China’s largest steelmaker, Baoshan Iron & Steel Co (寶鋼), unexpectedly announced that it would keep prices for its main products for February shipments unchanged from the January level. That came after China’s central bank announced a 0.5 percentage point increase in the reserve requirement ratio for commercial banks in order to contain a potential asset bubble.
Citigroup on Monday predicted that China Steel would raise prices today given recent rises in both spot and scrap steel prices in Taiwan.
The brokerage said that spot prices of hot-rolled coil had recently risen to NT$19,500 per tonne compared with China Steel’s NT$17,900 per tonne, while scrap steel prices had increased by 10 percent over the past two weeks because of maintenance for furnaces and bad weather.
“Traders [have] started accumulating steel products in anticipation of price hikes over the next few months,” Citigroup analysts Peter Kurz and Timothy Chen said in a client note.
Prices of hot-rolled coil, a benchmark product, was expected to increase by up to 5 percent to US$580 a tonne from around US$550, Citigroup forecast. The new March quotes would still be below regional and domestic spot levels, it said.
Given the widening gap between its prices and spot prices, as well as recovering domestic demand, China Steel was likely to continue raising domestic steel prices for April-May shipments when it announces new rates next month, according to both Capital Securities and Citigroup.
ISSUES: Gogoro has been struggling with ballooning losses and was recently embroiled in alleged subsidy fraud, using Chinese-made components instead of locally made parts Gogoro Inc (睿能創意), the nation’s biggest electric scooter maker, yesterday said that its chairman and CEO Horace Luke (陸學森) has resigned amid chronic losses and probes into the company’s alleged involvement in subsidy fraud. The board of directors nominated Reuntex Group (潤泰集團) general counsel Tamon Tseng (曾夢達) as the company’s new chairman, Gogoro said in a statement. Ruentex is Gogoro’s biggest stakeholder. Gogoro Taiwan general manager Henry Chiang (姜家煒) is to serve as acting CEO during the interim period, the statement said. Luke’s departure came as a bombshell yesterday. As a company founder, he has played a key role in pushing for the
China has claimed a breakthrough in developing homegrown chipmaking equipment, an important step in overcoming US sanctions designed to thwart Beijing’s semiconductor goals. State-linked organizations are advised to use a new laser-based immersion lithography machine with a resolution of 65 nanometers or better, the Chinese Ministry of Industry and Information Technology (MIIT) said in an announcement this month. Although the note does not specify the supplier, the spec marks a significant step up from the previous most advanced indigenous equipment — developed by Shanghai Micro Electronics Equipment Group Co (SMEE, 上海微電子) — which stood at about 90 nanometers. MIIT’s claimed advances last
CROSS-STRAIT TENSIONS: The US company could switch orders from TSMC to alternative suppliers, but that would lower chip quality, CEO Jensen Huang said Nvidia Corp CEO Jensen Huang (黃仁勳), whose products have become the hottest commodity in the technology world, on Wednesday said that the scramble for a limited amount of supply has frustrated some customers and raised tensions. “The demand on it is so great, and everyone wants to be first and everyone wants to be most,” he told the audience at a Goldman Sachs Group Inc technology conference in San Francisco. “We probably have more emotional customers today. Deservedly so. It’s tense. We’re trying to do the best we can.” Huang’s company is experiencing strong demand for its latest generation of chips, called
GLOBAL ECONOMY: Policymakers have a choice of a small 25 basis-point cut or a bold cut of 50 basis points, which would help the labor market, but might reignite inflation The US Federal Reserve is gearing up to announce its first interest rate cut in more than four years on Wednesday, with policymakers expected to debate how big a move to make less than two months before the US presidential election. Senior officials at the US central bank including Fed Chairman Jerome Powell have in recent weeks indicated that a rate cut is coming this month, as inflation eases toward the bank’s long-term target of two percent, and the labor market continues to cool. The Fed, which has a dual mandate from the US Congress to act independently to ensure