Surged Zinc Price to Lift Japan Coated Steel Price

Japanese coated steel dealing coil centers and distributors try to increase the reselling price when integrated steel makers and rerollers try to pass the higher zinc price on the selling price. The distributors rush to pass the higher cost price on the downstream market to keep profitability when they already experienced lower profit.Maruichi Steel Tube increased the selling price by 10,000 yen per tonne for all coated products on June 1. Yodoko announced the 10,000 yen of price hike for colored galvanizing steel for distributors effective on July 1. Nippon Steel indicates the firm will increase the coated products price depending on the users. Zinc price increased to US$ 3,900 per tonne in the month, which is near 4 times of 10 years average at around US$ 1,000. Speculating purchase lifted the metal price. Japanese steel makers decided to pass the higher cost price on the selling price citing they cannot absorb all the cost. Distributors expect the makers’ hike is 5,000-10,000 yen per tonne. However, they could have trouble to increase the reselling price with the lower construction demand along with shrinking distributors’ market due to higher contact based transactions.