A number of countries have exceeded the quota for hot-rolled steel since the beginning of Q4

A number of exporters have already exceeded their import quotas for hot-rolled steel in the “other countries” category since the start of the new quota period (October 1 – December 31). SteelOrbis reports this with reference to EU customs data.

The quota for each individual country in this category is limited to 15% (141,849 tons) of the total available volume of 945,665 tons.

Thus, Japan has registered 251,333 tons of hot-rolled plates for customs clearance, Vietnam – 242,292 tons, Taiwan – 155,950 tons. Egypt registered 144,517 tons. Australia and Brazil have not yet used their quotas for hot-rolled coils in the “other countries” category.

Turkey, which has the largest individual quota in the EU at 475,174 tons, has submitted 78,991 tons for customs clearance, meaning 83% remains available.

In January-July 2024, the EU imported record volumes of HRC – more than 6.2 million tons, which is about 400,000 tons more than in the first 7 months of last year.

In August, the European Commission announced the launch of an anti-dumping investigation into imports of certain types of hot-rolled steel from Egypt, India, Japan and Vietnam. Even before the investigation was launched, the European market had been expecting potential retroactive duties on imports of hot-rolled coils.

As GMK Center reported earlier, the investigation into these four steel exporters could affect more than half of the bloc’s hot-rolled coil imports (about 2.2 million tons). In January-May 2024, these countries accounted for about 51% of HRC imports to the EU.