Kanto Steel to Reduce Domestic Steel Bar Supply in Summer

Ibaraki based small bar making electric furnace steel maker, Kanto Steel reduces the output in August more than usual maintenance outage to meet the output level to slow domestic building demand. The firm idles the steel making and rolling operations from August 18-23. The firm tries to expand the export to cover the slow shipment for domestic market. The firm estimates the shipment for domestic market will decrease by around 10% to 72,000-73,000 tonnes in April-June from same period of 2007. The firm expects the shipment decreases by around 10% in July-September from April-June. The firm reduces the domestic supply by expanding the outage for better supply balance while the firm takes chance in the booming offshore market through regular export activity. The firm tries to get spot export order, instead of long term fixed contract to avoid risk for price change of ferrous scrap.