Baosteel, the nation’s largest listed steelmaker has cut the prices of its main steel products by about three percent for the first time in the nine months, Shanghai Securities News reported.

By rights, many companies should have closed. Instead, they march on like zombies, China’s industrial undead.
China simply makes too much steel. The government estimates that China’s annual production is about 100 million tonnes more than it should be, a figure equal to the whole annual output of the industry in the United States.

U.S. companies operating in China cited rising labor costs as the biggest risk to their business in the country for the first time, the 2013 China Business Climate Survey Report by the American Chamber of Commerce in China, AmCham China, showed.

At $80 in September 2012, the iron ore price was at its lowest for the past 3 years. In 3 months, it surged to a current price around $150 a tonne, a 80% increase! But will it last? As it is often the case, China is the reason for the soaring price of the metal required to produce steel.

Worldwide steel mills have reached a total estimated supply capacity of 1.8 billion tons, vs. a steel global demand of only 1.5 billion tons. Like Europe, China produces too much steel and it must restructure its industry.

Copper prices shot to their highest settlement in seven weeks as a batch of better-than-expected economic data from China had traders betting the world’s top industrial-metal consumer was turning the corner.

Copper‘s 2.9% rise this week reflected the market’s belief that “demand is going to be significantly improved in 2013,” said Bill O’Neill, a principal with commodities trading and consulting firm Logic Advisors.

The Chinese government continues to restructure and modernize its rare-earths industry. In a move that Beijing describes as “promoting orderly development”, it will provide direct subsidies to revive struggling rare-earths producers – a tacit acknowledgment of the strategic importance of the industry.

Copper prices have so far resisted the sharp fall in other metals prices since the outbreak of the crisis in the euro zone last year. But they are now below the $8,000 per tonne threshold. The copper cycle, which lasted for more than ten years now, might have reached its end.

The Worldsteel Association, which includes almost all of the global steel producers, released its October 2012 Short Range Outlook (SRO) for 2012 and 2013. Steel demand will slow down further in 2013: it will only be 2% in 2012, 3, 2% in 2013, against 6% over last year.