Japan Sheet Steel Stock Rises by 6.1% in April

Japanese inventory of hot, cold and coated sheet steel held by makers, distributors and coil centers increased by 6.1% or 236,000 tonnes to 4.066 million tonnes at end of April from March. The stock hit the first 4 million tonnes since 4.257 million tonnes in March 2009. Japanese steel industry enters crisis mode to the oversupply when the demand decreases sharply mainly in automobile and manufacturers after the major earthquake.

The major sheet steel users of Japanese automakers including Toyota Motor and Nissan Motor normalize the domestic operation in June through the effort to accelerate the normalize activity. However, the sheet steel demand increases the slump in construction market and distribution market after major national holiday in early May. The makers should adjust the production and shipment to reduce the inventory.

Nippon Steel source said the firm tries to normalize the inventory level as soon as possible by adjusting the production to meet the current demand level while the firm still tries to watch the demand situation.

The sheet steel stock increased by 4.1% to 1.82 million tonnes for the makers at end of April from March. The stock increased by 18.6% to 880,000 tonnes for the distributors and by 1.8% to 1.365 million tonnes for the coil centers. The stock increased by 3.7% to 2.006 million tonnes for hot rolled flats steel and by 14.2% to 1.323 million tonnes for cold rolled flat steel while the coated steel inventory decreased by 0.1% to 737,000 tonnes. The total inventory rate for the shipment increased by 0.64 points to 2.85 months. The stock rate increased by 0.4 points to 2.86 months for hot rolled flat steel, by 1.06 points to 3.41 months for cold rolled flat steel and by 0.76 points to 2.6 months for coated steel. The total sheet steel inventory hit record 4.733 million tonnes in January 2009.