India: Spot Ferro Silicon Offers Remain Firm on Continued Tight Supply

Ferro Silicon offers firmer on higher trades amid constant demand and limited supply.

Dispatches from Bhutan have returned back to normalcy, and the Bhutanese producers raised their offers to INR 86,000/MT (Ex-Bhutan) to match their prices with that of offers from North-East of India. Ferro Silicon (70-75%) remains unchanged at INR 86,000/MT (Ex-Guwahati). However, sell-side participants are expecting the prices to march northwards very soon.

“There has been a huge demand in the domestic market which makes it difficult for us to cope with, hence, prompting us to raise our offers,” said a producer source while discussing the commodity’s demand-supply mismatch situation.

Another producer source mentioned that “most of the producers are booked out but the excess inquiries received has impelled us to offer at a premium,” referring to increasing demand for the commodity.

Demand from overseas has also been increasing as most of the Bhutanese producers are focusing on exports.

Though Bhutan exports Ferro Silicon globally, Europe has been a region of attraction for most of the producers lately. “Demand from Europe has been exceptionally high as there is a very little Ferro Silicon available in the region. It has not been receiving Ferro Silicon from Russia, which is its largest exporter of the aforementioned commodity,” informed another source explaining the reason for such good demand from Europe.

On the other hand, another source justified the unavailability of Russian Ferro Silicon in Europe as the latter has imposed anti-dumping duty on the former’s commodity, making it unviable for Russians to do business there. Moreover, he also debunked the reason for which Russia is not exporting Ferro Silicon to India as they are getting better realization value locally.

SteelMint assessed export prices at USD 1,450/MT FOB Kolkata but producers are negotiating at USD 1500/MT and higher in view of the low availability of the commodity in Europe.

On the future outlook, sell-side participants are confident that the elevated prices will soon find acceptance owing to the momentum observed in both domestic market and overseas.