Oriental Morning Post reported that most market players all held optimistic towards domestic steel market after the lunar New Year while the market transactions were sluggish these days. Lots of steel traders prepared storages before Spring Festivals with a bid to reap profits after holidays.

Now, the construction steel prices were mainly prevailing at CNY 5,000 per tonne in East China area with that in the spot market hitting at CNY 4,800 per tonne. One week before February 17, the home spot market presented a hiking trend, but quickly fell down in later periods. Market players predicted that there would be a price dive showing in future market. The terminal purchasing volume didn't see any pickups in local market while the traders basically held wait and see attitude towards the market with slight market deals.

At present, the market inventory of construction steel still keeps growing in Shanghai with bad market demand and traders would be in face of more difficulties in future market operation as the government restructures the economy and competition heats up on the global market. Steel prices made sharp gains last week with traders buoyed by expectations of a rapid recovery in demand as the temperatures rise and construction activity resumes but purchases from end users have remained slow.

(Sourced from MySteel.net)
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