According to data from China's National Bureau of Statistics (NBS), although China's steel production increased on an annual basis in December 2024, the slowdown trend continued on a monthly basis.
In December, crude steel production was 75.97 million tons, up 11.8% y-o-y. However, there was a decline of 3.1% compared to the previous month. This is attributed to the impact of reduced demand, especially towards the end of the year, due to the growing recession and the upcoming Chinese New Year holiday (28 January - 4 February). During the same period, pig iron production increased by 9.4% y-o-y to 66.7 million tons, while steel products production grew by 7.1% y-o-y to 119.1 million tons.
Looking at 2024 as a whole, China's crude steel production was 1,005.09 million tons, down 1.7% compared to 2023. In the same period, pig iron production decreased by 2.3% with 851.74 million tons. Steel products production increased by 1.1% with 1,399.67 million tons.
The annual decline in crude steel production slowed to 1.7%, following a 2.7% drop in the first 11 months of the year.
The production decline observed in December was mainly attributable to weak demand in China's domestic market. The slowdown in construction, automotive and infrastructure sectors weighed on steel demand, while economic growth data for the last quarter of the year also fell below expectations.
In addition, due to year-end inventory management and increased holiday preparations, planned restrictions were put into effect on the production side. However, at the beginning of the year, there were signs of recovery in the first days of January. Between January 1-10, the daily crude steel output of large and medium-sized steel mills, which are members of the China Iron and Steel Association (CISA), was 2.065 million tons, up 10.3% compared to the last 10 days of December. This gives hope that there may be some movement on the demand side.
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