Nippon Steel Keeps Top Share of Hot Rolled Output in F2008

Japanese hot rolled sheet output decreased by 17.2% to 40.15 million tonnes in fiscal 2008 (Apr08-Mar09) from fiscal 2007. Japanese top sheet maker was Nippon Steel in fiscal 2008. No.2 was JFE Steel, no.3 was Sumitomo Metal Industries, no.4 was Nisshin steel and no.5 was Kobe Steel. Their ranking didn’t change in fiscal 2008 from last year.

Nippon Steel’s sheet output decreased by 19.6% in fiscal 2008 from fiscal 2007. JFE Steel’s sheet output decreased by 15.0%. Market share of Nippon Steel decreased to 38.3% from 39.5% in fiscal 2008 from fiscal 2007 while JFE Steel’s share increased to 36.3% from 35.4%.

JFE Steel kept stable export to a alliance partnerin South Korea for January-March. Sumitomo Metals’ output decreased by 16.7% in fiscal 2008 from fiscal 2007. Kobe Steel’s output decreased by 16.7%. Market share of Sumitomo Metals didn’t change at 10.4%. Kobe Steel’s share didn’t change at 5.4%, too. Nisshin Steel’s share increased to 6.5% by 0.3 percentage points.

As for electric furnace steel maker, Nakayama Steel Works got ahead of Tokyo Steel Manufacturing for the output. Tokyo Steel Manufacturing decreased the sheet output by 28.7% to 600,000 tonnes in fiscal 2008 from fiscal 2007 when the firm stopped the export in the last half of fiscal 2008 due to dropped Asian market price. Nakayama Steel Works’ output was higher than Tokyo Steel Manufacturing’s by about 4,000 tonnes.