Against the backdrop of tight domestic quotas and rising raw material prices, Tokyo Steel announced on January 29 that it will raise the prices of some sheet materials by 2000 yen/ton (14 US dollars/ton) in February, marking the company’s first increase since July 2023. Although the pace of demand recovery in local automotive and other manufacturing industries remains uneven, with generally low freight volumes, due to long-term procurement restrictions by steel mills, their distribution inventory is at a low level, and some sheet products are in short supply.
The company has not yet adjusted the prices of construction steel, citing a shortage of labor and some building materials in the construction related industry, which has forced the postponement of construction plans in many parts of the country. On April 1st, the Japanese construction industry will officially implement the “overtime limit”, which means that construction workers are not allowed to work more than 360 hours of overtime per year (except in special circumstances such as natural disasters). At that time, the construction period nationwide may be extended as a whole, thereby suppressing the demand for steel.