Japan Special Steel Order Drops by 58.9% in January

Japanese special steel order receipt decreased by 58.9% to 715,000 tonnes in January from a year earlier, which decreased by 21.6% from December and showed year-to-year declines for 4 months in a row, according to Japan Iron and Steel Federation. The order receipt declined by 59.2% to 503,000 tonnes from domestic buyers and for export declined by 58.4% to 212,000 tonnes.

The domestic order receipt decreased for automobile dropped by 68.3% to 126,000 tonnes in January from a year earlier. The order receipt for automobile, which is the largest application of special steel, was 398,000 tonnes in July and it have been around 370,000 tonnes per month until October. However, the order receipt decreased to 304,000 tonnes in November and showed further decline to 199,000 tonnes in December.

For industrial machinery showed the recent peak of 162,000 tonnes in July and moved around 150,000-160,000 tonnes level per month until October while it declined to 122,000 tonnes in November, to 74,000 tonnes in December and to 56,000 tonnes in January.

The order receipt of export decreased below 400,000 tonnes in October and in December was 250,000 tonnes while it has been around 500,000 tonnes per month since December 2007 to September 2008.

Automobile makers began output reduction in October under the global recession and Japanese special steel order receipt decreased to 1.537 million tonnes from 1.670 million tonnes in September. The order receipt decreased to 1.232 million tonnes in November and to 0.912 million tonnes in December.

Japanese industry interests expect the special steel order receipt turns upward in April from January-March level when Toyota Motors and other Japanese automobile makers announces to increase the domestic production gradually. However, it is unforeseeable if the order receipt increases to 1.7 million tonnes per month after April.