Regarding analysis about the steel due to COVID-19
CIS
Regarding analysis about the steel due to COVID-19 Ukraine
In the last week of March, ArcelorMittalKryviy Rih worked in Ukraine, temporarily suspending the No. 1 blooming mill and the No. 3 light rolling mill at one of its two flowering plants. The facility will remain idle until the quarantine caused by a coronavirus in Ukraine on April 24. The plant will continue to operate mills 1 and 5, while mill 5 will maintain half of its capacity. The company said that in April and May, the output of its main products (long products, billet and pig iron) will be 20% lower than normal.Given that last year, the plant’s average monthly saleable output was 390,000-393,000 tons, and the monthly output from April to May may fall by 80,000 tons to 310,000-313,000 tons/month.
Metinvest, a Ukrainian mining and steel group, said this week that if the operations of its Italian plant will not return to normal soon, it will have to cut output from its Ukrainian steel plant. Since March 24, due to the coronavirus pandemic, its business has decreased significantly. The production of utility steel from Italian medium and heavy plate coil producers Ferriera Valsider and Trametal, owned by Metinvest, has decreased by 40,000 metric tons.
The steel mill is scheduled to restart on April 3, but if the Italian government resumes quarantine, Metinvest will also be forced to reduce the output of its Ukrainian steel mills, mainly in Azovstal, which supplies slabs to Italian steel mills. If the situation continues, Metinvest does not rule out the temporary suspension of Azovstal’s slab continuous casting. The company may also consider blowing down No. 3 blast furnace in Azovstal and postponing the restart of the refurbished No. 4 blast furnace until May (expected to begin in April).
Although the two-week quarantine work began on March 30 in the Karaganda region where it is located, the Temirtau steel plant in Kazakhstan is still operating normally. “The company is in steel production, coal and iron ore mining as well as continuing to fulfill its obligations to customers.”
