Raw material
In the 2025/26 business year, the market environment for key raw materials and energy showed moderate overall volatility, despite isolated weather-related and geopolitical influences. Within the voestalpine Group, iron ore, coking coal, and coke are the primary input materials for the Steel Division and the Metal Engineering Division in the blast furnace process. At the LD steelworks, recycled scrap and alloys are added to the pig iron. In the High Performance Metals Division, high-quality recycled steel scrap and various alloying elements are primarily used in the field of electric arc furnace technology.
Iron ore
Iron ore is a natural mineral typically extracted from the Earth’s crust, which contains iron in the form of iron oxides, primarily hematite and magnetite. Iron ore is the most important raw material for the production of crude steel via the blast furnace route.
China remained by far the world’s largest steel producer in the 2025 calendar year, despite a decline in crude steel production to below one billion tons for the first time since 2019. In contrast, crude steel production in India increased significantly in 2025, although the country plays only a minor role as an importer of iron ore and thus exerts limited influence on international pricing.
After the volatility of the iron ore price had already decreased significantly in the 2024/25 business year, price movements in the 2025/26 business year were also characterized by only moderate fluctuations. While the iron ore price stood at just over 100 USD per ton (61% Fe, CFR China) at the start of the business year, it fell to around 90 USD per ton by the first quarter of the 2025/26 business year. Subdued steel production in China dampened demand for the most important primary raw material used in steel production. A slight recovery set in over the summer months, leading to a sustained stabilization of iron ore prices at just over USD 100 per ton by the end of the 2025 calendar year. High inventory levels in China had a slight dampening effect on prices at the beginning of the 2026 calendar year. By the end of March 2026, the price was trading within a narrow range between approximately USD 100 and USD 110 per ton.
Coking coal
Coking coal, also known as metallurgical coal, is the key raw material for the production of metallurgical coke. It is produced by heating coal in the absence of air at high temperatures. Coke serves as a reducing agent in the blast furnace process and forms the internal structure of the furnace that ensures the permeability of the gas flow.
In the 2025/26 business year, Australia, as the leading exporter of coking coal, continued to play a central role in the global supply structure and consequently in international price formation. At the same time, alternative supply regions, such as North America, continued to gain importance. On the demand side, Asia remained the dominant force in the 2025/26 business year. In addition to China as the largest consumer of this raw material, India’s importance in particular has grown steadily in recent years.
At the start of the 2025/26 business year, the price of coking coal was volatile, fluctuating within a range of approximately USD 170 to USD 200 per ton. By the end of the 2025 calendar year, the price had risen moderately to about USD 220 per ton. In the fourth quarter of 2025/26, the market experienced periods of significantly stronger price increases, reaching up to around USD 250 per ton. These were primarily due to weather-related supply disruptions, including flooding and temporary port closures in Australia caused by a tropical cyclone.
Steel scrap
Steel scrap is a valuable supplementary raw material in blast furnace-based steel production and forms the central raw material basis in the electric arc furnace route, alongside high-purity iron carriers such as HBI (Hot Briquetted Iron). Steel scrap is generated as a byproduct of production processes, for example, from scrap generated during the manufacture of automotive parts. The vast majority of the steel scrap used comes from the recycling of steel products that have reached the end of their life cycle and are reprocessed by recycling companies. Steel is thus an integral part of a circular economy.
At the start of the 2025/26 business year, prices initially declined slightly from around USD 380 per ton (CFR Turkey) to approximately USD 330 by the end of April 2025. Subsequently, scrap prices stabilized over the summer months before prices increased moderately in the third quarter of 2025/26 business year. By the end of the 2025 calendar year, prices had returned roughly to the starting level of early April 2025. After a period of several months with largely unchanged price trends, prices rose to around USD 390 per ton toward the end of the 2025/26 business year.
Alloys
To define the material’s properties, such as strength, hardness, corrosion resistance, toughness, and workability, alloys are essential in steel production. In steel mills, alloys are used in addition to pig iron and steel scrap to produce high-quality steel grades. Premium-quality alloys account for a significant portion of total raw material usage, particularly in the production of tool steel and specialty materials within the High Performance Metals Division. For this division, nickel is the most important alloying element.
Contrary to the trend of previous years, the price of nickel on the London Metal Exchange (LME) remained very stable in the 2025/26 business year, hovering around USD 15,000 per ton in the first three quarters of the 2025/26 business year. Only toward the end of the 2025 calendar year did the nickel price record a significant increase of about 20%. This development was driven by Indonesia’s announcement, one of the world’s leading nickel producers, that it planned to implement production cuts. As a result, the nickel price rose to around USD 18,000 per ton, reaching its highest level since the spring of 2024. At the end of March 2026, the nickel price stood at approximately USD 17,000 per ton.
Ferro-vanadium was also characterized by largely stable prices for much of the 2025/26 business year. Significant price increases did not emerge until the start of the 2026 calendar year. Ferro-molybdenum and ferro-chromium, on the other hand, exhibited somewhat higher price volatility throughout the entire 2025/26 business year.
Energy
Natural gas and electricity are among the voestalpine Group’s key energy sources. voestalpine’s blast furnace-based steel sites in Austria are largely self-sufficient in electrical energy thanks to the internal conversion of metallurgical gases generated during the production process into electricity. In contrast, the electric arc furnaces used for stainless steel production in the High Performance Metals Division require large amounts of external electricity. Natural gas is primarily used to heat crude steel prior to further processing in the rolling mills and for the heat treatment of steel products.
At the start of the 2025/26 business year, the natural gas price initially fluctuated between approximately EUR 30 and 40 per MWh (THE settlement spot market, Germany) before stabilizing at just over EUR 30 per MWh by the end of the 2025 calendar year. At the start of 2026, climate-related increases in demand caused prices to rise to over EUR 40 per MWh. In early March 2026, geopolitical tensions in the Middle East resulting from the temporary closure of the Strait of Hormuz led to a rapid surge in natural gas prices to over EUR 60 per MWh. Toward the end of the 2025/26 business year, the price settled at around EUR 50 per MWh. The company’s own gas storage reserves of 1.5 TWh, contractually secured in May 2022, were reduced by half in the 2025/26 business year. However, voestalpine continues to maintain its own gas storage capacities for strategic hedging purposes.
The price trend for electricity was initially characterized by a period of decline at the beginning of the 2025/26 business year. By the end of the first quarter of the 2025/26 business year, the electricity price had fallen to around EUR 65 per MWh (EPEX AT base spot market). Subsequently, the price rose steadily to about EUR 115 per MWh by the end of the 2025 calendar year. At the beginning of the 2026 calendar year, geopolitical tensions led to further price increases to around EUR 140 per MWh, before the electricity price began to decline again and stood at around EUR 115 per MWh at the end of March 2026.