China's steel prices on the spot market continued their upward momentum this week (November 2 to 6), but by a smaller margin, according to the monitor of information provider MySteel.com. This is the third week of this round of steel price rises.

Prices of building steels generally have recovered further, by 50 yuan/ton at the highest in several cities; prices of medium plates rose slightly, by 60 yuan per ton at the highest in Beijing and Tianjin; cold-rolled and hot-rolled products dropped at the beginning of the week but rose again later.

MySteel said altogether 38 mills adjusted the factory prices for screw steel this week, and 41 producers adjusted wire rod factory prices. Raising prices by a small margin is the mainstream of this week's price adjustment.

MySteel summarizes factors that will impact the future steel prices as follows:

First, policies for curbing the excessive steel production capacity will come out by the end of this year, said Xiong Bilin, an official with China National Development and Reform Commission.

Secondly, most steel plants will overhaul equipment usually as the year-end arrives, which will bring about production cuts.

Thirdly, spot prices of iron ores are rising slowly. The Indian ores were priced at 94 US dollars/ton this week, 1 US dollar higher than last week.