Firm Stainless Plate Price in Tokyo

Stainless plate steel price is firm at 390,000 yen per tonne for SUS304 hot cut sheet and 500,000 yen for plate mill products around Tokyo. The demand is firm due to higher capital expenditure by private sector while the makers including Nippon Steel & Sumikin Stainless Steel operate plate mill at full capacity. The price is expected to keep firm under the tight supply. Japanese hot rolled stainless flat steel inventory held by processors decreased by 4.8% to 36,393 tonnes at the end of July from June, according to association of stainless plate shearing processors. The inventory decreased for 5 months in a row while their shipment surged in July and kept more than 10,000 tonnes per month for 7 months in a row. Nickel price hit record US$ 15.7 per pound at cash price of London Metal Exchange on Thursday. The metal price keeps more than US$ 13 in August while the price kept more than US$ 10 since July. With the higher price, domestic stainless makers will increase the selling price to cover the high cost price. The users don’t shift to chrome series stainless plate despite of the extreme high nickel price. The distributors could have hard time to pass the higher cost price on reselling price.