Kobe Steel to Hike Al and Cu Rolled Products in June

Kobe Steel aims to raise the selling price of aluminium and copper rolled products, including aluminium plates, extrusions, copper sheets and strips, said Hiroyuki Nakayama, Kobe Steel’s senior managing director, at a press conference on 9 May. The firm decides the details of the price hike, the time schedules and the hike ranges, within this month and will start the official announcement to the customers in June.Kobe Steel’s aluminum & copper company estimates the company’s consolidated operating profit would drop down by 63.6% to 8 billion yen for fiscal 2008 started April compared with fiscal 2007. The company aims to improve the profitability by the price hike.Mr. Nakayama explained Kobe Steel has suffered from productive costs higher by 2.5 billion yen per annum than originally estimated such for energy and subsidiary materials. Fuel and magnesium costs have jumped up even more. The most recent cost expansion is estimated at 3.5 billion yen per year. In addition, the aluminum & copper company obtains profit impact by 100 million yen per year when the exchange rate fluctuates by 1 yen per US dollar.Other Japanese aluminium and copper manufacturers have announced the intention to raise their rolling charges as well. Sumitomo Light Metal Industries announced the firm raises the rolling charge for the all rolled aluminium products by 10-20% effective for April shipment. Showa Denko plans to raise the rolling charge for aluminium plates and extrusions by 10-15% in June. The manufacturers decided the hike to reflect the expansion of productive costs.