Editorial – December 2022
Customer is the most important guest in your premises’ is a very famous statement and is seen being displayed in many shops. Such is the importance of ‘customer’ or if one sees this in the context of industry, such is the importance of ‘demand’. Yes, if demand is there everything else can be managed, created, isn’t it !
The global metals industry today is caught in a delicate situation. The US has already started showing signs of recession. May be in the next few months it will be officially announced. European economy is stagnated since many years and whatever demand is remaining, energy / gas scarcity will further erode it. I am afraid, European countries (barring few exceptions like Germany, France) will also enter a long recession in few months from now. After the real estate bubble burst in China, their economy is far from healthy. Their growth projections have already been slashed down drastically by ADB and other global bodies. In all likelihood, their exports as well as the domestic demand will suffer a jolt. Many of the Middle East region countries are actually the satellite economies of the US and the western world and move up and down in tune with them. Also the IUI (infrastructure Utilization Index) being very low in the region, there is a limit to the developmental activity and thus is not expected to contribute much to the metals demand in next few years. Africa is still not fully awake and the steel demand in most of the countries is insignificant. Where does all this leave us ?
Where is the economy and the metals demand growing ? The answer is undoubtedly ‘India’. Yes, it is. Firstly, the continuous and sizable domestic demand has protected India from entering into recession. Whatever happens in the rest of the world, the country as big as 135 crores population and boasting of the biggest middle class in the world can not be short of demand. Secondly, as its IUI is very high, one can expect a huge and sustained developmental activity here which will ensure metals demand curve heading north.
All this is not only hallow theory. We are seeing it happening on the ground. The user industries like construction and auto are manifesting robust growth. All the major metal business houses are implementing very big expansion plans. Domestic metals production climbing up and still the imports are also rising. Such strong is the metals demand push !
In my opinion this is the time to take a bit extra risk and bait your money on Indian economy and metals sector ! What say you ?