Steel mills stop production and post-disaster reconstruction earthquake boost steel exports

“The earthquake in Japan has caused damage to the coastal steel companies. The supply of high-grade steel for automobiles and shipbuilding will be limited. In addition, future reconstruction after the disaster will boost China’s steel exports in the future.” On the morning of the 14th, the director of the research center of domestic steel information organization Mysteel Wang Jianhua said.

Affected by the earthquake and tsunami, many Japanese steel mills suffered. According to the latest statistics on damage to steel in the northeastern Japan, as of noon on the 12th, Japan's largest steel company, Nippon Steel, has ceased production at Kamaishi Steel Works in northern Japan. Sumitomo Metal Industry's blast furnace at Kashima Iron and Steel Plant in Ibaraki Prefecture was damaged, and the blast furnace has stopped production after the earthquake. Japan Steel Engineering Holdings (JFE) has clarified that previous media reports of a fire at its steel plant in Chiba were false, but confirmed that the blast furnace at the plant has been suspended.

The latest news of Nippon Steel yesterday showed that some of its facilities at Kamaishi Steel Works were flooded, the ports near the factory were destroyed, and the repair of the equipment was not completed as expected. However, the company's Kimitsu Steel Plant in Tokyo has resumed production after the aftershocks.

Wang Jianhua believes that the earthquake directly affected the 26 million tons of crude steel production capacity of the three major steel plants in Japan. The most influential steel products are sheet metal and plate, which are mainly used in the automobile and shipbuilding industries, and the next most important ones are wire rods. For the automotive and construction industries, stainless steel, profiles and steel pipe production capacity are also affected.

Wang Jianhua said that the export of some steel products in Japan will be affected in the short term. According to data from the Japan Iron and Steel Federation, from 2009 to 2010, the order quantity of steel in the affected area accounted for about 30% of the total amount of Japanese steel orders. He expects that the export volume of Japanese sheet and medium plate will decrease significantly in the next six months. The supply and demand balance of these two varieties in Asia will be broken and the market price is expected to rise accordingly.

In 2010, Japan exported 43.40 million tons of steel, which accounted for approximately 45% of its output. It is the world's largest steel exporter and its main export destinations are South Korea, China and other parts of Asia.

At the same time, Japan’s post-disaster reconstruction is expected to drive Asian countries’ exports of construction steel. According to Wang Jianhua's analysis, the earthquake will cause a reduction in the domestic steel demand in Japan in the short term, but in the next 1 to 2 weeks, with the gradual development of post-disaster reconstruction, the demand for domestic building materials in Japan will increase sharply. According to historical data, the amount of Japanese building materials imported from China basically accounts for 40% to 50% of its total imports.

In addition, the damage suffered by Japanese steel companies will reduce the global iron ore shipping market demand in the short term. Han Xun, China regional manager of Global Steel News (SBB) TSI index, one of the three major iron ore indexes in the world, said that due to the high ore price some time ago, the current market is entering a downward phase, and the Japanese earthquake will increase the pessimism of the global ore market. Emotions to accelerate the price drop.

On March 11, the price of 62% taste of iron ore in Qingdao port fell more than 2%, and dropped to 168 US dollars/ton. While the main contract of iron ore swap market fell by 4%, the main contract price in June was only around US$140/ton.

Not long ago, Japanese steel companies had just reached a major increase in iron ore supply agreements with international iron ore giants. From April, the price of imported iron ore in Japan will rise about 25% from the first quarter of 2011, a record high.

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