In July, rebar futures prices fluctuated all the way down, and the price at the end of the month fell by about RMB 200/ton from the beginning of the month. At the beginning of August, rebar futures continued their decline in late July. The prices fell by nearly 100 yuan/ton on August 1 and August 2, respectively, and the lowest price of the main contract fell below 3,800 yuan/ton. At present, the weather is still hot, the contradiction between supply and demand has not been significantly alleviated, and the spot price of steel continues to be weakly adjusted. In early August, the rebar futures market may be difficult to change, and the price will fluctuate downward.

On August 2, the closing price, the highest price and the lowest price of the main RB1910 contract for rebar futures were 3,816 yuan/ton, 3,845 yuan/ton and 3,724 yuan/ton, respectively, down 124 yuan/ton and 129 yuan respectively from July 26. / ton and 202 yuan / ton, the decline was 3.15%, 3.25% and 5.15%. As of 23:00 on August 2, the latest price of the main contract of rebar futures was 3,790 yuan / ton, down 15 yuan / ton from the previous trading day, down 0.39%, the highest price and lowest price of late night were 3834 Yuan/ton and 3783 yuan/ton, showing a general downward trend. The latest prices for rebar 1907, 1909, 2001 and 2005 contracts were 3,750 yuan / ton, 3,871 yuan / ton, 3,566 yuan / ton and 3,456 yuan / ton, both of which were lower than the settlement price on August 1, respectively. -0.27%, -0.59%, -0.78% and -0.46%.

In the spot market, iron ore prices have fallen, steel billets and steel prices have fallen, and market transactions have been poor. According to the monitoring of relevant institutions, as of August 2, the average price of Φ25 mm III grade rebar in the 10 key cities in China was 3,933 yuan/ton, down by 81 yuan/ton on week-on-week, down by 2.02%, and down by 163 yuan/ton on a month-on-month basis. The decline was 3.98%; the social inventory of construction steel in 29 key cities nationwide was 6,954,300 tons, an increase of 179,900 tons on a week-on-week basis, an increase of 2.66%, an increase of 722,800 tons month-on-month, an increase of 11.6%. Although the high temperature and rainy weather affected the release of terminal demand to a certain extent, the operating rate of steel mills was not affected and remained at a high level, which led to both steel mills and social steel stocks rising. At present, steel social inventories have risen for eight consecutive weeks.

In terms of macroeconomics, in the first half of the year, China's economic operation was generally stable and maintained within a reasonable range. GDP (gross domestic product) reached 450.93 billion yuan, a year-on-year increase of 6.3%. In July, the China Manufacturing Purchasing Managers Index (PMI) was 49.7%, up 0.3 percentage points from the previous month and down 1.5 percentage points year-on-year, below the critical point. This indicates that although the manufacturing economy has rebounded, it is still in the contraction zone. From the sub-indices, the production index and supplier delivery time index are above the critical point, and the new order index, raw material inventory index and employee index are below the critical point. This indicates that the overall expansion rate of manufacturing production is accelerating, and the delivery time of raw material suppliers is slightly accelerated. However, the order quantity of products is declining, the inventory of major raw materials is decreasing, and the employment rate of enterprises is declining.

At the same time, the real estate business activity index and the employee index are lower than the critical point, indicating that the total real estate business has declined and the number of employees has decreased. The construction industry business activity index, new order index, input price index and sales price index fell by 0.5 percentage points, 1.3 percentage points, 0.3 percentage points and 1.7 percentage points respectively. Only the construction industry employee index and business activity expectation index were respectively It rose by 1.7 percentage points and 1.1 percentage points. This shows that the construction industry is still expanding, but the pace of expansion has slowed down, new orders have decreased, raw material prices have declined slightly, and industry output has dropped significantly. However, the number of employees in the industry has increased significantly, indicating that the industry is still generally optimistic.

In addition, Sino-US trade negotiations have revived. US President Trump said on August 1 that the United States will impose a 10% tariff on US$300 billion of goods imported from China from September 1 this year. On the same day, the Federal Reserve announced that it would cut the federal funds rate by 25 basis points to 2% to 2.25%. These news triggered the risk aversion of the industry to heat up again, accelerating market adjustments, and steel futures and spot prices were affected to varying degrees.

However, domestic environmental protection and production restrictions have increased, policies have become stricter, and steel prices have been supported. For example, the second round of the central government's ecological environmental protection supervision work was officially launched, and the major steel producing areas responded positively. “Shijiazhuang City 2019 Air Pollution Comprehensive Treatment Work Plan” “Wu'an City 2019 Steel Coking Cement Industry Strengthened Control of Air Pollution Prevention and Control in August Local documents such as the "Program" have been introduced. This will help to control the excessive growth of steel production and boost market confidence.

To sum up, since the beginning of this year, although the domestic economy has generally operated in a reasonable range, the growth rate has shown a slowdown. Despite the steady development of a number of steady growth policies in the country, terminal demand is still less than expected, compared to the excessive growth of steel supply, resulting in an imbalance between supply and demand in the market and a fall in prices. Whether it is steel spot or futures, the main tone of the price decline will not change in the short term. Due to the increase in output, the decline in demand, the reduction of support for raw material costs, and the impact of factors such as Sino-US trade consultation and US interest rate cuts, it is expected that the price of rebar futures will fluctuate slightly in early August, and the overall trend is downward.