EU increased imports of semi-finished products from Ukraine by 38.2% y/y in Q1

Ukrainian steel companies shipped 291.6 kt of semi-finished steel products to the EU market in Q1 2024, up 38.2% year-on-year. This is based on GMK Center’s calculations based on Eurostat data.

European consumers’ spending on imports increased by 32.4% compared to January-March 2023 – to €151.71 million.

The main consumers of Ukrainian semi-finished products among the EU countries during this period were:

• Bulgaria – 108.8 thousand tons (+103.6% y/y);
• Poland – 86.99 thousand tons (-14.5% y/y);
• Italy – 48.1 thousand tons (+167.4% y/y).

In March 2024, the EU imported 110.8 thsd tonnes of semi-finished products from Ukraine, up 10.7% month-on-month and 78% y/y. Import costs increased by 12.7% m/m and 74% y/y – to €58.94 mln.

Overall, in January-March 2024, the EU increased imports of semi-finished products by 7.5% compared to the same period in 2023, to 1.81 mln tons. In March, import volumes increased by 27.1% m/m and 27.4% y/y – to 735.7 thsd tonnes. Thus, Ukrainian suppliers accounted for 16.1% of the total imports of EU semi-finished products for 3 months.

The largest importers are Italy and Belgium – 566.6 thousand tons (+6.3% y/y) and 356.4 thousand tons (+0.9% y/y), respectively.

As GMK Center reported earlier, in 2023, the EU reduced imports of semi-finished products from Ukraine by 2.8% compared to 2022, to 1.03 million tons. Imports in monetary terms decreased by 23% y/y – to $532 million. The largest importers were Poland – 252.3 thsd tonnes (+29.3% y/y), Bulgaria – 513.5 thsd tonnes (+23.4% y/y), Italy – 112 thsd tonnes (-64.6% y/y).