Turkish scrap imports fall

Turkish scrap imports fell 26% year on year in January to 1.24 million tonnes, according to the Turkish Statistical Institute (TUIK). Their average cost was $ 331.1 /t against $ 320.8 /t in January 2018.

January tonnage was lower than in all periods, except for one monthly volume of scrap imports - September - in 2018.

Approximately 98.5% of imports in January came from obsolete ferrous scrap, of which the US supplied 214,398 tons, down 45% from last year. Consumption from the Netherlands rose 71% to 187,040 tons, but Russia supplied 181,675 tons, down 15%.

Consumption from the UK more than halved to 100,030 tonnes and Canada delivered zero from more than 156,000 tonnes in January 2018. However, deliveries from Germany increased almost fivefold to 143,938 tons. This was the largest monthly tonnage supplied by Germany to Turkey since March 2003.

Due to sluggish demand for rebar in Turkey's domestic market and mills' efforts to secure export deals, most manufacturers cut their capacity utilization in January and therefore required less scrap metal.

Turkey's steel production fell 19.5% year on year in January to 2.57 million tonnes, the lowest monthly tonnage since September 2015. Production of scrap metal consumed fell 26.5% to 1.6 million tonnes, while BOF steel production fell less sharply - 4.7% to 966,000 tonnes.

In 2018, Turkey's scrap imports fell -2% year-on-year to 20.7 million tonnes, up 15% year-on-year in the first half of last year.