TOKYO — The rally in the Japanese scrap market continues unabated, with Tokyo Steel Manufacturing Co. Ltd. raising its purchase prices for the fourth time in two weeks.

Japan’s largest electric-arc furnace operator and effective benchmark price setter raised its purchase prices for deliveries to all five of its works by an additional ¥500 ($6) per tonne.

As a result, it will now pay ¥25,000 ($306) per tonne for deliveries to its Utsunomiya Works; ¥24,500 ($300) per tonne for seaborne deliveries to its Okayama factory; ¥24,000 ($294) per tonne for overland deliveries to the plant, as well as all deliveries to its Kyushu and Tahara plants; and ¥23,000 ($282) per tonne for those to its Takamatsu service center.

After cutting its purchase prices to their lowest levels in more than three years in late October, the company has hiked its prices by as much as ¥2,500 ($31) per tonne, taking delivery costs to its Okayama plant back to levels seen in early October and those at its Utsunomiya plant to late-September levels.

Regional scrap purchase prices are being driven higher by the recent hikes in Chinese product prices, with those in the domestic market also being helped by a weaker yen and higher export prices.

A version of this article was first published by AMM sister publication Steel First.