Vietnamese rolling mills use domestic hot-rolled steel to avoid US tariffs
It was reported that in order to avoid the anti-dumping duties imposed by the US, the Vietnamese billet rolling mills turned to the domestic market to purchase hot-rolled coils and plates.
The US Department of Commerce (USDOC) announced on August 8th that it would conduct anti-dumping investigations on cold-rolled and color-coated sheets imported from Vietnam which used hot-rolled base material from Taiwan or South Korea.
As a result, the hot-rolling procurement channels of the Vietnamese rolling mills have been restricted, and the US has begun to tax flat materials imported from Vietnam using hot-rolled base materials from China.
Formosa Ha Tinh Steel Corporation (FHS) was the leading manufacturer of hot-rolled coils in Vietnam with a capacity of 3.5 million tons per year. The US and Europe were the main export markets for Vietnamese cold-rolled coils and color coated steel plates.
In 2017, the US imported a total of 156,000 tons of cold-rolled flat steel, 130,000 tons of color coated steel plate and 125,000 tons of hot-dip galvanized coils from Vietnam.
