Reuters reported the fire damage of French Aperam, the third largest stainless steel maker in Europe, will benefit Outokumpu and other European producers and lead the EU stainless steel prices to rise.
This fire in its Gueugnon plant damaged main processing line and affected production until at least second quarter, its capacity annual can reach 350,000 tons.
Market participants said that they will be shortage of cold rolled coils in the coming months thus imports and price will increase inevitably.
Aperam was looking for alternative sources of semi-finished products to keep the produce finished products maintained. The tighten supply demand relationship should sustain the market price in the next few months.