Profits of Chinese metallurgists in January-July fell by 90.5% y/y

The gross profit of the Chinese sector of smelting and rolling of ferrous metals according to the results of January-July 2023 decreased by 90.5% compared to the same period in 2022 – to $4.96 billion. This is evidenced by the data of the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS), reports SteelOrbis.

The aggregate profit of large and medium-sized enterprises in China decreased by 15.5% y/y to $0.55 trillion in 7 months. Only 13 of the country’s 41 industrial sectors saw an increase in gross profit, and 28 saw a decrease.

During this period, the automotive sector increased profits by 1% y/y, to $36 billion. At the same time, the profit of the metal mining and beneficiation sector fell by 32.6% y/y, to $3.7 billion, metal processing – $11.2 billion (-6.1% y/y), production of railway, marine, aerospace and other equipment $11.2 billion (-30.4% y/y).

Note, in May profits of a Chinese steel mill industry decreased by 20% compared to May 2022 – to 668.1 billion yuan ($95.2 billion). Compared to April, the indicator decreased by 0.3%.

As reported by GMK Center, according to the results of July 2023, China increased steel production by 11.5% compared to the same period in 2022 – up to 90.8 million tons. In general, global steel production during this period increased by 6.6% y/y. – up to 158.5 million tons.