Earlier in 2020, Turkish producers had mostly preferred to serve the local market and avoid competition with other suppliers in the global arena, but November was marked with a surge in export billet sales.

However, the aggregated figures remained very low on annualized base, losing more than a half. The main support traditionally came from North Africa, first of all Morocco.

In November, local mills increased overseas billet shipments by 64.8% on annualized base to 58,368 t, according to the Turkish Statistical Institute (TUIK).

The lion share of the volumes was booked by Morocco (30,000 t) and Tunisia (24,000 t) during the reported month.

Despite an uptrend in billet sales in November, export performance remained insufficient over the eleven months of 2020. Turkey reduced billet sales to international customers by 50.4% to 597,814 t over the reported period.

Morocco remained the key billet buyer for Turkey, purchasing around 305,000 t or 51% from the total tonnages.