Annex (iv)
STAINLESS STEEL
MARKET
Stainless steel is a global product with annual
production reaching 22 million tonnes in 2003 and anticipated
to grow by 5-6% in the coming years. There are major producers
in Europe, North and South America, Japan, Korea, China and Taiwan.
In recent years there has been much consolidation in the industry.
For example, in Europe, whereas there were 10 producers at the
beginning of the 1990's, today there are just four, who together
with the next largest producer account for 70% of melted production
worldwide. Outokumpu's share is approximately 10%.
|
| Major Producers | Country
| Meltingcapacity Mt/a |
Comments |
|
| Outokumpu Stainless | Finland, Sweden, UK & USA
| 2.75 | |
| Thyssen-Krupp Stainless | Germany & Italy
| 2.88 | Also own Mexinox, Mexico
|
| Arcelor (Ugine & ALZ) | France & Belgium
| 2.13 | Also own Acesita, Brazil
|
| Acerinox | Spain
| 0.93 | Also own NAS andColumbus
|
| Posco | S Korea
| 1.74 | |
| Yusco | Taiwan
| 0.93 | |
| Tisco | China
| 0.40 | |
| Nippon Steel Alliance | Japan
| 2.16 | |
| Kawasaki Alliance | Japan
| 0.92 | |
| AK Steel | USA
| 1.02 | |
| Allegheny | USA
| 0.51 | |
| J&L | USA
| 0.44 | Owned by Arcelor butAllegheny to buy
|
| North American Stainless(NAS) | USA
| 0.70 | Owned by Acerinox
|
| Columbus | S Africa
| 0.65 | Owned by Acerinox
|
|
The growth in demand for stainless steels has been significantly
faster than its main competitor materials, ie aluminium and carbon
steel. This strong growth has been underpinned both by improvements
in technology and by producers achieving larger economies of scales.
The price for stainless steel can vary considerably over an economic
cycle both because of the supply/demand balance and because of
raw material costs. However, the conversion margin or spread (the
difference between the price we can sell at and the cost of incoming
raw materials) for stainless steel has been decreasing by 2% per
annum on trend and prices have fallen likewise in real terms also.
Whilst the average world growth is forecast at 5-6%, there
is considerable regional variation. Over the next five years stainless
demand in Europe is expected to grow at 3-4% per annum and in
North America at around 2% per annum both considerably lower than
in the 80's and 90's. However, China's growth is forecast at 11%
per annum and even this may be an underestimate given the growth
rates of 20-25% per annum over the past three years. High growth
is also expected in South East Asia and in Eastern Europe and
the CIS. These changing patterns reflect both the surge in industrial
and infrastructure investment in developing markets and the migration
of stainless consuming manufacturing industries to these lower
cost countries.
TOP 10 MARKETS FOR MAIN PRODUCTS IN '000 TONNES IN 2003
|
| Region/Country | Cold rolled
| Hot rolled | Long products
|
|
| W Europe | 3,203
| 842 | 900
|
| E Europe | 179
| 56 | 50
|
| CIS | 75 |
38 | 20
|
| N America | 1,475
| 356 | 400
|
| Latin America | 334
| 86 | 100
|
| Middle East | 84
| 41 | 30
|
| Asia | 6,619
| 1,285 | 1,400
|
| of which China | 3,182
| 301 | 500
|
| of which Japan | 1,240
| 531 | 400
|
| Others | 297
| 67 | 100
|
| Total | 12,266
| 2,771 | 3,000
|
|
|
