Vietnamese-origin aluminum billet, traded in Southeast Asia, is expanding into Japan, Japanese market sources said Monday.
A Japanese consumer said he was offered several hundred metric tons per month of Vietnamese-origin billet from several sellers based in Vietnam and Japan.
A seller offered "$1-$3/mt less than the price the consumer currently pays," he said. The consumer turned down the offers as he was satisfied with his supplier's offer.
A Japanese trader said he has heard Vietnamese-origin billet being offered to buyers in Australia, Taiwan and other Southeast Asian countries at $20/mt below the market levels.
The offer was from a Vietnamese extruder with a plant in Ho Chi Minh, the trader said.
Since Vietnam has no aluminum production, the extruder imports ingot and processes it into billet, sources said.
Another Japanese consumer said he had heard earlier this year of Vietnamese material offers in Southeast Asia at a $40/mt discount.
"There were talks of offers for shipments to Japan too, but I am not sure if there were regular buyers," he added.
Some consumers in Southeast Asia have agreed to set the 2017 contract billet prices at $135/mt of billet processing fee plus the quarterly Japanese ingot import premiums, S&P Global Platts reported earlier.
The 2017 price levels were roughly $10-$20/mt below the 2016 levels, sources said.
