Acting for steel mills is a traditional way for steel trade enterprises to develop. Starting from the shortage of iron and steel industry, obtaining steel mill agents is not only the main way to make profits, but also the embodiment of the company's strength. Almost all big companies started to grow and develop by acting as agents for steel mills. For example, Huaye, Giant Eagle, Hejun, Bao Min, Shunye, Xing Shan, Wangbao, Minxingda, Minlurun and other companies.
The advantages of this method are: stable resources and continuous supply, which is conducive to developing downstream customers and influencing the market, and is more concerned by end customers and small trading companies around the company's large-scale inventory resources. In the past long years, steel prices have been fluctuating but the overall upward trend, strictly acting as agents for steel mills, creating high profits for a long time.
The disadvantage is that the ordering policy is unilaterally designated by the steel mill, and the agent has no right to speak and is in a passive position. When making sales policies, steel mills first consider their own interests, and may give profits to agents during the price increase period; In the period of falling price fluctuation, steel mills are forced to ask agents to meet their own ordering requirements according to their own ordering policies, and transfer the risk of market changes to agents.
Its subsidies and feedback measures to agents often cannot make up for the losses of agents. This situation has been obvious since 2006. From 2003 to 2005, the production capacity of steel industry expanded greatly, which also became one of the fundamental reasons for the price collapse in 2005.
However, as a result, steel mills have entered a strong period, and the policies on agents have become more and more strict, which has led to great changes in agents since 2007. Some large companies withdrew from the steel mill agreement households and entered the spot field to compete for short-term futures resources, which intensified the competition in the industry. The market is becoming more and more active. ?
Second, the binding terminal mode
There are many enterprises in the steel trade industry, some of which specialize in serving large terminal enterprises, signing tripartite agreements and maintaining continuous business operations. This model often has a variety of bundled cooperation conditions in terms of funds and business. For example, Hubei Huitong is to Chery Automobile, Hubei Friendship is to PetroChina Tianbao, and Hangzhou Xintai is to the southeast of Zhejiang.
Every customer has created a high proportion of sales and profits for the company, with a monthly supply of at least 10000 tons. At the same time, this model is essentially a trade financing method. This kind of customer requires the other party to have high credit conditions, which is difficult to develop and needs long-term tracking. According to Hubei Huitong, they followed Chery Automobile for two years before they started to operate the specific business.
The advantage of this method is that the customers are large, the demand is stable and continuous, and the steady growth of sales and profits can be guaranteed. The disadvantage is that a single customer has a large weight in the company's business, and the customer has changed, which has a huge impact on the company's business, resulting in a sudden decrease in sales and profits, and the company was caught off guard for a while.
In 2008, PetroChina Tianbao created a third of the profits for Hubei Lianyi. Less than one-tenth in 2009, mainly due to the financial crisis, customer orders decreased significantly, resulting in no orders for several months, which led to the suspension of the company's business.
By August this year, when customers start placing orders, there is no need to advance funds for customers, because during this period, customers' accounts receivable are basically recovered and funds are idle. Customers directly order 20,000 tons of pipeline steel from steel mills, and traders are no longer needed.
Third, the current mode of cooperation. The primary premise of this model is that traders keep a large amount of cash in their hands, and the main varieties are hot coils, rebar and wire rods.
If the customer's abundant resources in the spot market can't meet the company's sales demand, they will hedge in the futures market (futures in the previous period, bulk steel products, supply steel products and so on). The advantage of this method is to lock in risks, avoid unpredictable situations, maintain the continuity of daily business and avoid serious losses.
The disadvantage is that the goods are often shipped in advance when the price rises, which leads to the loss of excess profits caused by market changes and misses market opportunities. ?
Fourth, the operating market model?
When I think it is appropriate, I will buy spot on a large scale, hoard it in a fixed market, wait for the price to rebound and sell it at a high price. The main sources of resources are market spot, steel spot and short-term futures of steel mills. The advantages of this method are grasping the market, large-scale operation, high profit and low daily management cost. The main cost is the public relations and research expenses of steel mills.
The disadvantage is that once the market makes a wrong judgment, it may pay a painful price. Some traders think that they are entering at a low level, resulting in serious losses. This situation is due to the eagerness to carry out a large number of businesses, frequent intervention in the market for many times, and winning small profits in the big changes in the market, which is not worth the candle. ?
Extended data:
1. Expand market scope and increase business opportunities. Boss magazine said that traditional transactions are limited by time and space, while internet-based e-commerce is a 24-hour global operation, and online business can reach the market range that traditional marketers can't reach through sales and advertising promotion.
2. Reduce transaction costs. First of all, online marketing activities can improve the marketing efficiency of enterprises and reduce the promotion costs. According to statistics, advertising on the Internet can increase sales by 10 times, and its cost is110 of traditional advertising.
3. Reduce inventory. In order to cope with the unpredictable market demand, enterprise managers have to keep a certain product inventory, and because enterprise managers are not sure about the raw material market, they often keep a certain raw material inventory.
4, reduce the management cost of enterprises, without too much written materials and documents, reduce the expenditure of office supplies and labor costs, and also reduce the communication cost.
5. Good communication with customers. Consumers can directly contact and communicate with enterprises, and directly consult products and services from enterprises. At the same time, enterprises show the contents of products and services to customers with words, pictures and images, and explain and answer customers' inquiries, so that the whole pre-sales and after-sales services are timely and clear.
Baidu Encyclopedia-Interest Chain of Steel Trade of Central Enterprises