As France goes into a new national lockdown this week, the construction sector is seen slowing in April, seasonally the best month for rebar sales. This puts a significant dampener on construction sector confidence, which had improved in March.

Rebar sellers tell Kallanish that domestic activity for rebar has been hampered by Covid-19-related uncertainty over the past two months, but renewed lockdown measures are likely to add concern and slow new projects being financed.

French rebar demand has consequently slowed, with buyers only ordering small tonnages and purchasing solely for their immediate needs. Domestic rebar values remain at €330-340/tonne ($387-398) base ex-works, flat on March.

French construction industry managers’ confidence over future activity, nevertheless, improved significantly in March, according to a l’Institut National de la Statistique et des Études Économiques (Insee) report. More companies in the construction industry than in the previous month anticipate an increase in their future activity over the next three months. Notwithstanding the new lockdown, the opinion of construction companies on the state of the sector is also said to be more optimistic.

Employment prospects were more favourable than in February, and the opinion of construction companies on their order books also improved in March. Given their present staff size, current order books provide 8.4 months of work, stable on February.

On the downside, last month’s capacity utilisation rate decreased slightly after a rebound seen in January. Meanwhile, 40% of business managers interviewed reported production bottlenecks, same as February but higher than its long-term average. “In particular, one in five business managers have felt bottlenecks due to a lack of personnel, a higher proportion than on average,” the report says. Insee also noticed a sharp rebound in the balance of opinion of business managers on the future development of prices.