Scrap consumption by steel mills continues to decline

TOKYO (Scrap Monster): According to latest statistics released by the Japanese Ministry of Finance (MoF), the scrap consumption by the country’s steel mills has extended its decline during the month of January this year. The scrap consumption by mills had declined to lower levels during Dec ’14 too.

The scrap consumption by the country’s steel industry totaled 2.77 million tons in Jan ’15. This is 7.2% lower than the total scrap consumed during the same month a year ago. The scrap consumption during Jan ’14 had totaled 2.985 million tons.

The scrap purchases by Japanese steel mills during the month totaled 1.895 million tons, down 15.9% year-on-year. Among them, 1.77 million tons were carbon scraps, accounting for over 93% of the total scrap purchases. The carbon scrap purchases were down 16.3% over the previous year. The other major scrap purchases include alloy scraps (86,000 tons, down 11.1%) and pig iron scrap (39,000 tons, down 7.1%).

Meantime, the average price of Japanese H2 scrap snapped its downward trend to rise marginally during the first week of April. The H2 scrap prices had declined for fourteen straight weeks prior to this.