India’s JSW Steel 2022/23 expects exports to fall to over 5-year low

India’s JSW Steel Ltd JSTL.NS expects its exports to fall to a more than five-year low at 10% of overall sales in the fiscal year to March 2023 because of slowing global demand and an export tax, a company executive said on Thursday.

India’s largest steelmaker by capacity expects to sell 24 million tonnes of steel in the fiscal 2022/23 year, Seshagiri Rao M.V.S., joint managing director and group chief financial officer, told Reuters in an interview.

“Global economy is slowing down. Adding to that, there is an export duty, which has come in. Both together, I think, has made the country lose that competitive advantage,” Rao said.

“We can’t completely get out of export market … because these customers are developed painstakingly over a period of time.”

Finished steel exports from the world’s second-biggest crude steel producer more than halved during the first seven months of the fiscal year that began in April, partly on account of a 15% export tax on some steel intermediates that the federal government levied in May.

JSW Steel aims to produce 25 million tonnes of crude steel this year, up 28% from last year.
Source: Reuters (Reporting by Neha Arora; Editing by Mayank Bhardwaj and Rashmi Aich)