Bangladesh bright spot for US ferrous scrap exporters

Global – Comparing the first 11 months of 2016 with the same period in 2015, US ferrous scrap exports slid 4% from 10.563 million tonnes to 10.151 million tonnes despite sizeable increases in shipments to some of leading customer nations.

Mexico’s purchases of US scrap soared 34% year on year from 952 053 tonnes to 1.277 million tonnes while India took delivery of 976 880 tonnes in January-November last year for an increase of 8% over the corresponding period in 2015, according to data from the US Census Bureau and International Trade Commission.

However, these gains were eclipsed by the 204% surge in US ferrous scrap shipments to Bangladesh – from 96 045 tonnes in the first 11 months of 2015 to 291 836 tonnes in the same period last year.

These increases were more than offset by the significant reduction in American shipments to other key markets, including Turkey (-19% to 2.825 million tonnes), Taiwan (-9% to 1.114 million tonnes) and South Korea (-20% to 771 064 tonnes).

Somewhere way further down the table were US ferrous scrap shipments to China.