Hyundai Materials visits Asian Metal

On the morning of 14 October, Kiho Song, Raw Material Team Leader of Hyundai Materials Corporation, and Hyun Seok Yang, Materials Team Assistant Manager of Hyundai Materials Corporation, paid a visit to Asian Metal and talked with Alex Yuan, Asian Metal's market analyst of manganese and selenium, Jerry Huang, Asian Metal's market analyst of ferrosilicon and Miranda Zhang, Asian Metal's market analyst of ferrochrome.

As the second largest iron and steel producer of South Korea, Hyundai Materials Corporation plans to purchase 48,000 tons of manganese flake 99.7%min from China in 2019 based on long-term contracts. Firstly, Hyun Seok Yang had an in-depth discussion with Alex Yuan on current production, upstream supply and downstream demand and Q4 price trend of Chinese manganese flake and predicted that prices for manganese flake would hardly change in Q4. In addition, Hyun Seok Yang disclosed that the estimated purchase volume of manganese flake for 2020 would drop sharply by around 12,000 tons as the company consumes manganese flake at a low speed this year and expects a high remainder at the end of 2019.

Then, Hyun Seok Yang communicated with Jerry Huang on current production capacity and output of Chinese ferrosilicon and raw material price trend and paid close attention to whether Chinese government would reduce ferrosilicon export tariff or not. According to Hyun Seok Yang, Hyundai Materials Corporation invited bids to purchase 1,693 tons of ferrosilicon 75%min for November and December on Tuesday and the port of arrival is Pyongtaek port. Currently, ferrosilicon prices from Russian and Malaysian suppliers are lower than mainstream export prices for Chinese ferrosilicon and the offers from a few Chinese suppliers are similar to those from Malaysian suppliers.

Finally, Hyun Seok Yang discussed current Chinese LC and MC ferrochrome production capacity and production as well as raw material chrome ore consumption with Miranda Zhang. Hyun Seok Yang stated that South Korean steel mills consume nearly 6,000 tons of LC and MC ferrochrome per annum. Hyundai Materials Corporation imported LC ferrochrome V10 from China in 2015-2016 to supply South Korean steel mills for the production of special steel, but the procurement was put aside in 2017-2018 as Chinese LC ferrochrome prices were higher than Russia and Pittsburgh warehouse. Presently, South Korean steel mills purchase MC ferrochrome and 70% of LC ferrochrome from Russia and purchase 30% of LC ferrochrome from China. Hyun Seok Yang noted that Hyundai Materials Corporation plans to strengthen cooperation with Chinese LC ferrochrome producers in future.