Tokyo — Ordinary carbon steel orders booked by Japanese mills in May rose 8.1% year on year to 5.52 million mt, and were down 2.4% from April, latest Japan Iron & Steel Federation data released Tuesday showed.
A JISF official said domestic demand remained firm from both the construction and manufacturing sectors in the month, keeping Japanese mills busy.
Orders for domestic supply totaled 3.65 million mt in May, up 5.8% on year and down a marginal 0.1% on month, while orders for export rose 12.9% on year and were down 6.6% from April at 1.87 million mt.
Of the domestic orders in May, those for construction rose 7.7% on year and were down 4.5% from April at 942,000 mt and for manufacturing rose 1.1% on year and were down 1.6% on month at 1.59 million mt.
"Orders for export increased largely but the total is still below 2 million mt, so we can say export is still slow; mills have less availability for export," the JISF official said.
By product, orders for H-beams in May rose 11.1% on year and were up 4.2% on month at 331,000 mt, for bars rose 14.5% on year and edged down 0.5% from April to 621,000 mt, and for HRC rose 14.5% on year and were down 4.4% from April at 1.75 million mt.
"Orders basically start appearing in production two or three months later, so we expect production by mills will be higher after July," the JISF official said.
