The Week in One Page — Week of 4 July 2026
Bottom Line
Scrap prices into Turkey fell about $11 per tonne this week and have no floor yet. Hold your offers and wait — do not chase buying, because next week looks lower too.
5 Things You Need to Know
- Scrap sold into Turkey dropped to about $374 per tonne, down $11 in a week. Buyers keep pushing lower.
- The cheapest deal was British scrap at $369 per tonne — the first sale under $370 we had been watching for.
- The Strait of Hormuz shipping route reopened. That eases Gulf shortages, so regional buyers need less scrap. Bad for prices.
- Europe cut how much steel Turkey can sell into the EU (rebar down 37%). Fewer sales for Turkey means Turkey needs less scrap.
- We signed a new 400-tonne rails deal at $440 per tonne with our Lithuanian supplier — steady while scrap fell.
Top 3 Actions This Week
- Price any Turkey cargoes at $370–375 per tonne and hold offers. WHEN: all week. PRICE: $370–375 per tonne. WHY: sellers keep cutting, so waiting may save money.
- Re-check the Canada-to-Pakistan margin before buying more. WHEN: before the next order. PRICE: shipping rose ~$7 per tonne. WHY: shipping jumped 15–20% while scrap fell, squeezing both ends.
- Buy more Baltic rails near $440 per tonne while the gap is wide. WHEN: this month. PRICE: $440 per tonne. WHY: rails held firm while scrap crashed, so the resale margin is protected.
Why Prices Moved (and Other Changes)
Turkish steel mills have weak demand, so they refuse to pay up for scrap. The cheapest scrap — from Britain and Europe — set the market, and everyone followed it down. Two bigger changes made it worse. Europe cut Turkey’s steel export limits, so Turkey sells less steel and needs less scrap. And the Hormuz route reopened, so Gulf mills get normal supplies again and buy less scrap. Iron ore ticked up, but on rumor, not real demand.
What to Watch Next Week
- How low the cheap deals go. British scrap at $369 is the new bottom. A sale under $365 means another leg down.
- Turkish mills cutting output. A summer pause would tighten supply and steady prices. Nothing confirmed yet.
- Iron ore holding $100 per tonne. A drop below $98 pulls the whole metal market lower.
Plain-English Glossary
- Scrap — old steel collected to be melted into new steel.
- Rails (R65) — used railway track steel, sold as heavy scrap; the product in our Baltic deals.
- Iron ore — the raw rock used to make new steel; a rival input to scrap, so its price caps scrap.
- Rebar — reinforcing steel bars for concrete; a main finished product Turkish mills sell.
- Quota — a limit on how much steel a country may sell into the EU before extra taxes apply.
- Margin — the profit left after paying for the goods and the shipping.