Turkish mills have continued purchases of imported scrap from both short-sea and deep-sea suppliers.

A Turkish mill has bought a US-origin scrap cargo at $262/tonne cfr average price for 20,000 tonnes of HMS 90:10 and 10,000t of P&S for June shipment. As the HMS 1&2 80:20 price corresponds to $257/t cfr Turkey in this deal, prices remain unchanged compared to previous US and Baltic deals earlier this week, Kallanish notes.

Two mills recently booked one Russia-origin HMS 90:10 cargo each at $257/t cfr for 4,500 tonnes and 2,500 tonnes respectively. The previous HMS 90:10 cargoes from Russia were concluded last week at $250-251/t cfr. A Romanian supplier has also sold 12,000 tonnes of HMS 80:20 at $252/t cfr Marmara.

A Russian supplier is heard to have offered HMS 95:5 at $275/t cfr Turkey. Although a Turkish flat steel producer is heard to have bought this cargo at around $270/t cfr, this is yet to be confirmed.

EU-origin scrap sales were also heard on Thursday in the Turkish market concluded at $248-249/t cfr levels, but they were confirmed to be deals done last week. Turkish mills' price idea for EU-origin HMS 80:20 scrap remains unchanged at $247-250/t cfr.

Although EU-origin offers are still limited in Turkey, the number of US- and Baltic-origin offers is observed to have increased. US suppliers are said to be unhappy following the price decreases in their domestic market and have thus directed their cargoes to Turkey. On the other hand, Turkish mills have been unable to increase finished steel prices in line with scrap price rises. These factors may bring to an end the Turkish scrap import price uptrend.