Taiwan's scrap market has calmed amid the decline in prices, and steel mills are reducing their buying interest, resulting in pressure on both prices and volumes.

Although scrap demand and prices in the US market are still strong, sluggish demand in Taiwan has led to little buyer interest in US scrap. Containerised HMS 1&2 80:20 from the US West Coast is offered at $450-455/tonne cfr Taiwan, down another $10-15/t from last week. Taiwanese steel mills are indifferent to the price drop and no deal has been reached during the week so far. 

Japanese scrap prices have also fallen in Taiwan as Asian orders dropped. Japanese H2 50:50 was offered at as low as $470/t cfr Taiwan this week. Amid expectations of subdued demand, suppliers reduced their volumes to Taiwan.

Kallanish cut its weekly HMS 1&2 80:20 container scrap assessment on Wednesday to $450/t cfr Taiwan, down by $15/t from the week before.

The arrival of the summer power curtailment period also caused local steel plants to slow down production and reduce their demand for scrap. Taiwan's local scrap turnover rate has fallen amid shutdowns at some steel mills.

Major Taiwanese electric arc furnace mill Feng Hsin Iron & Steel has this week kept its rebar sales prices stable but cut scrap purchasing prices by TWD 300/t ($10.84/t). Its purchase price for HMS 1 is now at TWD 11,300/t and the list price for #5 (5/8 inches or 15.875mm nominal diameter base) rebar is at TWD 22,700/t ex-works.