From Alan Kohler:
China is flooding the world with cheap steel and Europe, the US and India are now starting to respond with tough anti-dumping measures.
Europe has imposed provisional duties on Chinese steel imports of up to 25.2 per cent, India has slapped on an anti-dumping duty of $US316 a tonne and, in the US, three anti-dumping filings have been made, claiming duties of up to 266 per cent.
According to Mark Pervan, they are losing an average of $4US0-50 per tonne selling steel into the domestic market because of a 17 per cent decline in real estate activity that has cut demand by 50 million tonnes.
…“The concern now for Chinese steel exporters is that if anti-dumping duties are introduced (which looks increasingly likely) the positive price arbitrage window will shut.
My own mail is that there is no “positive arbitrage”. The exports are largely making losses as well. The operations are being sustained at losses to protect jobs. This was my point about last week’s hope that a falling yuan will boost exports further. It won’t because the trade barriers will go up on what is very clearly a case of global steel dumping.
