Italian wire rod producers are considering increasing prices by around €40/tonne ($42) compared to April, citing the exhaustion of EU import quotas and longer delivery times for imported material.
A wire rod buyer says he is decreasing his prices as downstream consumption remains unreliable. Another buyer believes the hikes will not stick and re-rollers will continue to buy low volumes in May.
This is a quiet week in Italy, with no contracts being concluded as several executives are on holiday due to the Italian bank holiday on 25 April and Labour Day on 1 May.
A wire rod mill source reports low demand in April and "a dead market this week", though some activity is expected to restart after Labour Day.
Despite the import quota exhaustion, there is still demand for imported wire rod, but buyers are only willing to wait for the material if prices are significantly lower than domestic values.
A trader says he sold good volumes of Asian wire rod at the Tube & Wire trade show in Dusseldorf last week for lower-than-domestic prices, but no large contracts were agreed between buyers and Italian mills.
High-carbon steel wire rod sales volumes continue to be higher than low-carbon drawing-quality material. Domestic values for drawing-quality wire rod are now at €610-630/tonne ex-works on average, with mills considering pushing prices up to €670/tonne.
Meanwhile, northern European wire rod prices are flat again amid low demand, with domestic transaction prices for drawing-quality wire rod at €650/tonne ex-works and mesh-grade wire rod at €620/tonne.
