China Steel Corp (中鋼), the nation’s largest steelmaker, yesterday lowered its domestic steel prices by an average of 14.03 percent, or NT$3,353 (US$96.85) per tonne, moving closer to market pricing levels.
The Kaohsiung-based steelmaker said that the price cuts would only apply to April and May; prices for June would be determined separately. The cut will be retroactive to the first quarter, its press release said.
The price cuts per tonne are as follows: electrical steel coil, NT$4,500; steel plate, NT$4,166; electro-galvanized coil, NT$4,000; wire rod, NT$3,500; hot-rolled steel, NT$3,000; cold-rolled steel, NT$2,961; and hot-dipped galvanized steel coil, NT$2,869.
This was the first time for the firm, which usually announces prices on a quarterly basis, to adjust them on a bimonthly basis. The steelmaker attributed its decision to an expected rise in demand for steel products thanks to various economic stimulus packages worldwide, while major steel factories have been implementing large-scale output cuts in a bid to tighten supplies.
The combined effect of both factors could speed up the process of reaching a balance between supply and demand of steel products, it said.
China Steel also said it had advanced the date of maintenance for its No. 3 blast furnace to the middle of April. Production will not resume until early September at the earliest.
Output volume during this period is projected to fall between 40 percent and 45 percent below capacity, the statement said.
“China Steel’s price cuts were higher than my estimate of a cut of NT$2,000 for the second quarter and another NT$1,000 for the third quarter,” Angela Chuang (莊慧君), an analyst who tracks steel stocks at Capital Securities Corp (群益證券), said by telephone yesterday.
Chuang said China Steel’s move would enable it to “get out of bad situations sooner” and projected that its profit would improve on a quarterly basis this year.
Chuang maintained her target price of NT$25 for China Steel.
Shares of China Steel fell 0.43 percent to NT$23 yesterday, outperforming the benchmark TAIEX’s 2.17 percent drop.
Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) yesterday said that its investment plan in Arizona is going according to schedule, following a local media report claiming that the company is planning to break ground on its third wafer fab in the US in June. In a statement, TSMC said it does not comment on market speculation, but that its investments in Arizona are proceeding well. TSMC is investing more than US$65 billion in Arizona to build three advanced wafer fabs. The first one has started production using the 4-nanometer (nm) process, while the second one would start mass production using the
A TAIWAN DEAL: TSMC is in early talks to fully operate Intel’s US semiconductor factories in a deal first raised by Trump officials, but Intel’s interest is uncertain Broadcom Inc has had informal talks with its advisers about making a bid for Intel Corp’s chip-design and marketing business, the Wall Street Journal reported, citing people familiar with the matter. Nothing has been submitted to Intel and Broadcom could decide not to pursue a deal, according to the Journal. Bloomberg News earlier reported that Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) is in early talks for a controlling stake in Intel’s factories at the request of officials at US President Donald Trump’s administration, as the president looks to boost US manufacturing and maintain the country’s leadership in critical technologies. Trump officials raised the
‘SILVER LINING’: Although the news caused TSMC to fall on the local market, an analyst said that as tariffs are not set to go into effect until April, there is still time for negotiations US President Donald Trump on Tuesday said that he would likely impose tariffs on semiconductor, automobile and pharmaceutical imports of about 25 percent, with an announcement coming as soon as April 2 in a move that would represent a dramatic widening of the US leader’s trade war. “I probably will tell you that on April 2, but it’ll be in the neighborhood of 25 percent,” Trump told reporters at his Mar-a-Lago club when asked about his plan for auto tariffs. Asked about similar levies on pharmaceutical drugs and semiconductors, the president said that “it’ll be 25 percent and higher, and it’ll
CHIP BOOM: Revenue for the semiconductor industry is set to reach US$1 trillion by 2032, opening up opportunities for the chip pacakging and testing company, it said ASE Technology Holding Co (日月光投控), the world’s largest provider of outsourced semiconductor assembly and test (OSAT) services, yesterday launched a new advanced manufacturing facility in Penang, Malaysia, aiming to meet growing demand for emerging technologies such as generative artificial intelligence (AI) applications. The US$300 million facility is a critical step in expanding ASE’s global footprint, offering an alternative for customers from the US, Europe, Japan, South Korea and China to assemble and test chips outside of Taiwan amid efforts to diversify supply chains. The plant, the company’s fifth in Malaysia, is part of a strategic expansion plan that would more than triple
RSS