Japan Carbon Steel Import Drops by 37.7% in July

Japanese carbon steel import decreased by 37.7% to 221,931 tonnes in July from a year earlier while increased by 31.5% from June. Dealers mainly increased the import of steel sheet when the inventory adjustment progressed in the market.

H-beam import decreased by 80.0% to 3,703 tonnes in July from a year earlier. Wire rod import decreased by 1.3% to 22,334 tonnes and plate import downed by 66.2% to 5,639 tonnes. Hot-rolled flat steel decreased by 33.1% to 98,153 tonnes, cold-rolled flat steel decreased by 47.1% to 50,462 tonnes and zinc coated sheet decreased by 77.4% to 22,062 tonnes.

Compared with the previous month, H-beam import increased by 41.1% with the increase of hot-rolled sheet by 44.5%, cold-rolled sheet by 46.8% and electric zinc coated sheet by 51.2%.

Special steel import decreased by 23.3% to 15,004 tonnes in July from a year earlier. Secondary products import decreased by 27.5% to 44,299 tonnes.

The import decreased by 28.7% to 138,830 tonnes from South Korea in July from a year earlier, by 64.2% to 30,328 tonnes from China and by 30.5% to 41,733 tonnes from Taiwan. Tube import was 811 tonnes from Thailand and 668 tonnes from Germany. H-beam import was 664 tonnes from Russia. Hot rolled and cold rolled sheet imports were 7,011 tonnes from New Zealand.