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“Contracts with distributors include quarterly adjustments to gas prices related to variations, up or down, to Dated Brent oil prices and foreign-exchange rates of the Brazilian real and US dollar,” Petrobras said July 28.

The reference price for Dated Brent retreated 11% quarter on quarter, which offset a 3.2% increase in the value of the Brazilian real versus the US dollar.

The adjustment will go into effect Aug. 1 and cover the subsequent three-month period, which is part of normally scheduled price adjustments under current contracts, according to Petrobras.

The price cut was the latest adjustment at Petrobras, which changed the way it prices domestic natural gas and refined products under the administration of President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva and his Workers’ Party, or PT. Lula took over for his third non-consecutive term in January 2023. Lula and Mines and Energy Minister Alexandre Silveira have pushed Petrobras to reduce prices and increase domestic gas supplies to generate increased benefits under the more liberal New Gas Market regulator regime.

The Lula administration believes that cheap energy prices, especially natural gas, can stimulate industrial activity across Latin America’s largest economy. Since December 2022, a series of price adjustments by Petrobras has reduced domestic gas prices by 32%, according to the company.

Additional sales incentives for distributors implemented in 2024 could also yield further discounts, according to Petrobras. The discounts apply to distributors that acquire gas volumes above the minimum established volumes under updated contracts.

In addition to the reductions in gas prices, Petrobras has also implemented a series of adjustments to domestic diesel and gasoline prices, according to the company. That followed a May 2023 change in the company’s pricing policy, which shifted from the previous focus on matching import parity toward winning market share.

Petrobras has also reduced diesel prices by 34.9% since the Lula administration took over in January 2023, according to the company. Gasoline prices, meanwhile, are down 17.5% over the same period.

Record gas production

Petrobras and its partners developing offshore subsalt production sharing fields have also generated record-setting output in recent months after installing three new floating production, storage and offloading vessels.

Natural gas production also reached a fresh monthly record high in May, rising for a third consecutive month, Brazil’s National Petroleum Agency said July 1. Brazil produced 172.3 million cu m/d in May, an increase of 18.3% from 145.6 million cu m/d in May 2024. That topped the previous production record of 170 million cu m/d set in September 2024.

In addition to the greater production capacity, Petrobras and its partners started commercial operations of the Route 3 export pipeline and a gas treatment plant at the Energias Boaventura complex outside Rio de Janeiro in November 2024. The pipeline can transport 18 million cu m/d, while the plant can process 21 million cu m/d.

Most of the gas production, however, continued to be reinjected by oil companies to manage reservoirs, the ANP data showed. Oil companies reinjected 95.5 million cu m/d in May, leaving 55.4 million cu m/d available for commercial sale. Oil companies also flared or burned off about 4.3 million cu m/d during the month.

Silveira has pressured oil companies to reduce reinjection rates, but oil companies utilize the procedure to maintain reservoir pressures and manage output, according to companies and industry officials.

As part of the agreement, the bloc will import a combined $750 billion of US LNG, oil, and nuclear fuels over the next three years, according to a statement released by von der Leyen and an EU spokesperson.

The formal text of the trade deal has yet to be released. It is expected to be published by Aug. 1, according to the spokesperson. From there, it remains unclear whether it would then require approval from the European Parliament and Council. “We still do not know the exact legal basis it will have,” she said.

Several uncertainties remained in the meantime, including about the timing of the US energy purchases and about enforcement.

“Given the three-year time period in the stated informal agreement, we assume that much of the $750 billion of US energy purchases would likely need to include additional spot and short-term sales,” S&P Global Commodity Insights LNG analyst Ross Wyeno said. “The framework, as it stands, does not necessarily incentivize additional long-term contracting.”

Many see the $750 billion commitment as the EU doubling down on a pre-existing trend toward great trade dependency with the world’s largest LNG exporter as it seeks to wean itself off Russian gas and LNG following Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022.

“This deal is more of a rebranding of positions that were already emerging due to the market shifts post-2022,” said Youri Leconte, an LNG portfolio analyst with Calypso Commodities.

The EU, which lost access to cheap Russian fossil fuels following Moscow’s invasion of Ukraine, has seen its economy struggle due to high energy costs and has been diversifying its gas imports.

The US has become a key supplier. According to Commodity Insights data, the EU imported some 37.3 million mt of LNG from the US in 2024, accounting for around 45% of its total LNG deliveries.

The trading bloc is considering a proposal from the European Commission to phase out Russian gas and LNG imports by Jan. 1, 2028.

‘A declaration of intent’

While the July 27 agreement reaffirms a direction of travel toward greater EU-US energy trade, analysts are skeptical that LNG imports will skyrocket to the degree implied by the headline $750-billion figure.

“The EU would need to roughly triple its energy imports from the US in value terms,” said Anne-Sophie Corbeau, a research scholar with Columbia University’s Center on Global Energy Policy. “Unless prices massively increase and we import everything from the US (also replacing pipeline gas), we would barely get there.”

Extrapolating from 2024 figures, the EU would have to import 60% of its energy from the US to meet the target, according to Corbeau.

“Nobody in the EU wants such dependence,” said Leconte.

David Goldwyn, president of Goldwyn Global Strategies and chairman of the Atlantic Council Energy Advisory Council, said the $750 billion commitment “strikes me as both aspirational and to some extent unenforceable, but it’s a very positive signal in terms of encouraging European utilities to buy US LNG or to buy US crude and products.”

Goldwyn said the commercial terms of any forthcoming contracts will still have to be competitive since the EU cannot compel European utilities to purchase US energy.

Joseph Makjut of the US-based Center for Strategic and International Studies said that meeting the $750 billion would require considering not only LNG purchases but also crude oil, products, and maybe even nuclear reactors.

“You’re not going to make the jump to energy trade anywhere near hundreds of billions on LNG alone,” said Makjut, who heads CSIS’s energy security and climate change program. Achieving the goal would be difficult, but “I think that the US and the EU can find lots of ways to partner to increase energy exports to the EU that will be mutually beneficial and will realize the spirit of this trade negotiation.”

US LNG trade groups saw the announcement as encouraging but were still awaiting details.

“We are heartened to hear that the EU continues to view US LNG as a means to improve the energy security of its member states as it eschews all Russian energy imports by 2027 as well as a means to help reach an overall US-EU trade agreement,” said Fred Hutchison, CEO of LNG Allies.

EU energy imports totaled Eur375 billion ($437 billion) in 2024, according to Aldo Spanjer, Head of Energy Strategy at BNP Paribas. Of this, about Eur76.9 billion was from the US, with Eur15.3 billion from US LNG trade.

“The agreement is a declaration of intent more than anything,” Spanjer said.

Price impact

The US-EU trade deal comes as European LNG prices hit a recent low. Platts, part of Commodity Insights, assessed the DES Northwest Europe LNG marker at $10.818/MMBtu July 25, its lowest level since May 14. The price subsequently rebounded to $10.987/MMBtu July 28.

Across the Atlantic, Platts assessed the Gulf Coast Marker for US FOB cargoes loading 30-60 days forward at $10.14/MMBtu July 28, up 12 cents from the prior assessment.

Commodity Insights analysts expected the deal to be mostly bullish for global gas and LNG prices, based on positive market sentiment and expectations that talks are conducive and progressing ahead of Trump’s Aug. 1 deadline to impose substantial tariffs unless fresh trade deals are agreed upon.

“Much of the market optimism is focused on averting a more disruptive trade dispute; however, as seen in the US-Japan deal, many of the investments agreed are either preliminary or unclear in their scope and implementation,” the analysts said.

Many buyers are holding off from new purchases, pointing to adequate stock levels and anticipating further price reductions. As a result, trading activity remains muted, with a cautious and defensive tone dominating the market. Meanwhile, import activity has remained limited, with most offers stable compared to last week. While some market participants believe prices may have bottomed out, others still expect additional downward movement.

More specifically, most local HRC prices from mills in northern Europe, for July and August deliveries, have been voiced at €580-600/mt ex-works, down by €20/mt over the past week, while tradable prices in northern Europe have also declined further this week, by around €10/mt week on week to €560-580/mt ex-works levels. “The HRC market is expected to face further downward pressure over the summer. We have already heard bids at €545/mt ex-works,” a market insider told SteelOrbis.

“Several deals have been reported at €560-580/mt ex-works levels this week in Germany. Most believe that, even though sentiments are negative, prices from mills will not drop below €550/mt ex-works, though tradable prices have bigger room for falling,” a local trader said.

Meanwhile, in Italy, most offers from mills have dropped to €560-570/mt ex-works from €570-590/mt ex-works last week. At the same time, workable prices have dropped as well, falling to €540-550/mt ex-works levels, down by €5-10/mt week on week. Besides, according to sources, buyers remain cautious, with some speculative deals dipping to €535/mt ex-works.

In the meantime, import trading activity in southern Europe has remained rather subdued this week, with most offers for import HRC in southern Europe voiced at €470-530/mt CFR, depending on the supplier, the same as last week. HRC offers from one of the Indonesian mills have been reported at the lower end of the range or around €470-480/mt CFR, while offers from another Indonesian mill have been voiced at €495-505/mt CFR.

Besides, offers from India have been reported at $595/mt CFR southern Europe, which translates to around €508-510/mt CFR, down by €10/mt week on week. Meanwhile, offers from Vietnam have settled at $575/mt CFR, or around €490/mt CFR, while offers for ex-Thailand HRC have been reported at around €510/mt CFR.

Meanwhile, offers from Turkish suppliers have varied depending on the source, with most quoted at €515–530/mt CFR, duty paid, the same as last week. However, lower offers for ex-Turkey HRC for larger volumes have also been heard in the market, at around €480-500/mt CFR, duty paid. 

$1 = €0.85

addressing critical challenges in competitiveness, environmental compliance, energy costs, and decarbonization. The plan outlines both national and European-level strategies to support steel sector as one of Poland’s key industrial sectors during its crucial transformation period.

According to the ministry, Poland’s energy mix, which is still based mainly on coal-based sources of electricity generation, translates into a high cost of doing business in the country, and Polish steel mills are in a much more difficult situation compared to their foreign competitors. In order to combat rising energy prices, Poland will reform its cost compensation system for energy-intensive sectors by shortening disbursement deadlines and introducing advance payments to steelmakers. The plan also emphasizes increasing industry participation in applications that facilitate more flexible energy management and supporting renewable energy development efforts.

Poland will establish dedicated funding for metallurgical research and development activities to support the industry’s transition to low-carbon technologies. This fund will help steelmakers create specialized R&D programs linked to climate and digitization goals, while leveraging research institute capabilities to optimize industrial processes and achieve emission reduction targets.

To secure adequate scrap metal supplies essential for electric arc furnace production, Poland plans to evaluate exempting steel scrap from the SENT system – a trade measure maintained by National Tax Administration to monitor the transportation of sensitive goods with the purpose of preventing VAT evasion – which currently creates barriers to imports. The document notes that steel scrap inclusion in SENT has led to supplier avoidance and higher costs, undermining the competitiveness of domestic steel mills against countries without similar bureaucratic requirements.

At the EU level, Poland will push for modernizing trade protection measures, developing comprehensive tariff systems to replace expiring safeguard measures, and strengthening the Carbon Border Adjustment Mechanism (CBAM) to prevent resource shuffling and ensure fair competition.

The pace of growth slowed compared to the previous months (April +6.1 percent, March +7.5 percent). In the first five months of 2025, crude steel output in Italy reached 9.3 million mt, up 4.1 percent year on year.

In the long product segment, production in May amounted to 1.2 million mt, up 1.8 percent year on year. Cumulative longs output in the January-May period reached 5.4 million mt, increasing by 1.3 percent compared to the same period in 2024.

Flat steel production also performed positively. In May, output stood at 824,000 mt, rising by 9.0 percent year on year. In the first five months of 2025, flat steel output totaled 4.1 million mt, up 10.5 percent year on year.

The government “will adjust its existing counter-tariffs on steel and aluminum products on July 21, to levels consistent with progress that has been made in the broader trading arrangement with the United States,” according to a statement Thursday.

The US has 50% tariffs on foreign steel and aluminum, and Canada currently has 25% counter-tariffs on US-manufactured steel and aluminum products. But the two countries are currently negotiating on a trade deal, with a provisional deadline for the middle of July.

“We’ll continue these negotiations, of course, in good faith,” Prime Minister Mark Carney said at a news conference. “In parallel, we must reinforce our strength at home and safeguard Canadian workers and businesses from the unjust US tariffs that exist at present.”

The Canadian government will also introduce new rules for federal projects, restricting them to using steel and aluminum produced in Canada or by “reliable trading partners” that provide reciprocal access through trade agreements, according to the statement.The plan “falls short of what our industry needs at this most challenging time,” the Canadian Steel Producers Association and the United Steelworkers Union said in a joint statement. “We will continue to review the details of the measures and work constructively with the federal government to get a plan that works for Canadian steel producers.”

Canadian steelmaker Algoma Steel Group Inc. closed at C$9.54 in Toronto, up 4.5% and its highest level since March 6.

Canada is establishing new tariff-rate quotas to limit imports of steel from countries with which it doesn’t have a trade agreement — and it plans new tariff measures within weeks to address the risk of steel and aluminum dumping. Carney and his officials are worried that the Trump administration’s 50% tariffs on metals imports will cause global manufacturers to divert shipments to Canada.

The new quotas were not a request of the US during the trade talks, but are “a consequence of the US actions,” Carney told reporters.The prime minister also highlighted a C$10 billion federal loan facility that provides liquidity to large businesses struggling to access traditional market financing.

He made the announcement alongside cabinet ministers Dominic LeBlanc and Melanie Joly. Carney said he is speaking with President Donald Trump “relatively frequently,” and LeBlanc added he’s having ongoing conversations with Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick and will speak with Trade Representative Jamieson Greer on Friday.

Asked whether Canada would be willing to accept some US tariffs as part of a deal, Carney responded that true free trade is in the best interests of both countries.

“It’s a negotiation,” he said. “If it’s in Canada’s interest, we’ll sign it. If it’s not, we won’t.”

Higher offers have been mainly coming on CFR basis and from traders because prices on FOB basis have been stable or even slightly higher, so traders have been more cautious about offering in a short position.

A contract for a sizable lot of ex-China 5SP modified grade billet was widely discussed at $435/mt CFR Manila, while the lowest previous deal price level for 5SP billet in SE Asia was at $438/mt CFR to Indonesia and $440/mt CFR to the Philippines. But most sources polled by SteelOrbis agree that this deal was done last week, and not this week, as rumored initially. “For early last week, this price was right, and this is a very good deal for a buyer,” an Asian trader said, adding that most offers for 5SP billet are at $445/mt CFR or higher this week.

Also, another deal for 125 mm 5SP modified billet has been heard at $440/mt CFR also to the Philippines.

Also, at least one deal for Asian 3SP was heard as done to Thailand last week, but the final price has not been confirmed by the time of publication. Some sources believe it should be at $435/mt CFR or slightly below. This week, most offers for 3SP have been at $440-445/mt CFR in SE Asia.

Market sources believe that the current trend in Asia is still unclear, but lower prices are unlikely to be seen with the current FOB offers. In particular, most offers for Chinese billet have been at $425-430/mt FOB, while ex-Indonesia material is at $427/mt FOB.

The contract will have British Steel supply over 337,000 metric tons of rail track over a five-year period, the government said. Beginning in July, the deal would provide Network Rail with 80% of its rail needs and build on the £2.5 billion steel fund set up to boost steel production over the next five years. 

“This is great news for British Steel and a vote of confidence in the U.K.’s expertise in steelmaking, which will support thousands of skilled jobs for years to come,” said U.K. business minister Jonathan Reynolds. 

In addition to the British Steel deal, Network Rail will award smaller contracts to various other European manufacturers for around 80,000 to 90,000 metric tons of rail to ensure security of supply, Reuters reported. 

The legal case brought by the plaintiffs — toy companies Learning Resources and hand2hand — resulted in a ruling by the US District Court for the District of Columbia in late May that Trump did not have the authority to impose tariffs by citing a 1978 law called the International Emergency Economic Powers Act (IEEPA). That case is currently on appeal at the US Court of Appeals for the DC Circuit.

The plaintiffs today urged the Supreme Court to take the case and schedule oral arguments at the start of its fall term in October, or possibly in a special September sitting. The plaintiffs argued the Supreme Court will eventually have to rule on the case given the unprecedented use of IEEPA by the Trump White House to impose tariffs, so special consideration should be given to the case even before appeals courts rule on it.

The Supreme Court is under no obligation to fast-track the case.

The schedule for legal challenges to Trump’s authority is clashing with his claims to be negotiating multiple deals with foreign trade partners.

Trump cited the IEEPA to impose, then rescind, tariffs of 10-25pc on energy and other imports from Canada and Mexico in February-March. He used the same law to impose 20pc tariffs on China in February-March, and to impose 10pc tariffs on nearly every US trading partner in April.

The US Court of Appeals for the DC Circuit has stayed the toy companies’ case until the resolution of a separate, broader legal challenge to Trump’s tariff authority. In that case, the US Court of International Trade ruled in late May that Trump’s use of IEEPA was illegal and ordered the administration to remove all tariffs it imposed under that rubric and to refund all import duties it collected.

The trade court’s ruling is under review at the US Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit, which scheduled an oral argument on 31 July to hear from plaintiffs — a group of US companies and several US states — and from the Trump administration.

The trade court’s ruling in late May was unexpected, as it “actually ruled on the merits of the case, as opposed to just granting or denying an injunction,” according to Alec Phillips, chief political economist with investment bank Goldman Sachs’ research arm. “The question now is, will the Federal Circuit uphold the ruling, and will ultimately the Supreme Court uphold the ruling?”

The Trump administration argued that the legal challenges to its tariff authority could undermine its ability to negotiate with foreign trade partners.

The administration has so far produced two limited trade agreements, with the UK and China, despite promising in early April to unveil “90 deals in 90 days”.

Trump on Monday described ongoing trade negotiations as an easy process. “We’re dealing with really, if you think about it, probably 175 countries, and most of them can just be sent a letter saying, ‘It’ll be an honor to trade with you, and here’s what you’re going to have to pay to do'”, Trump said.

But on the same day he pushed back on calls from Canada and the EU to negotiate trade deals, arguing that their approach is too complex. “You get too complex on the deals and they never get done,” Trump said.

The legal challenges to Trump’s authority under IEEPA will not affect the tariffs he imposed on foreign steel, aluminum, cars and auto parts.

US trade statistics point to a significant tariff burden in place in April, the latest month for which data are available.The effective US tariff rate on all imports — the amount of duties collected divided by the total value of imports — rose to 7.1pc in April from 2.4pc in January.

Trump has dismissed concerns about the impact of tariffs on consumer prices, noting on Monday that “we’re making a lot of money. You know, we took in $88bn in tariffs.”

Treasury Department revenue data show that the US has collected $98bn in customs revenue for the year through 13 June, up from $63bn in the same period last year.