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More than half of the final steel used worldwide was in the construction and infrastructure sectors in 2019, with the mechanical equipment and automotive sectors coming in second and third. Steel is an alloy usually made by combining its main component iron and other elements. The largest steel-producing country today is China, accounting for 57% of the world's steel production by 2020. China will be the first country to produce more than one billion tons of steel by 2020.

Due to a decline in demand forecasts and investor speculation about the extent of supply restrictions that the Chinese government would impose, steel rebar futures dropped to CNY 3,170 per tonne in March, the lowest level in more than two months. In the first two months of the year, China's housing investment shrank by about 10%, and the country's new home prices dropped from the previous month, adding to worries that the country's real estate crisis has not yet subsided. Concerns that property developers may continue to be liquidated this year, eliminating the primary sources of rebar purchases in the world's largest consumer, were heightened by the ongoing decline in demand for real estate. Additionally, increasing trade barriers from abroad threatened mills' ability to offload sales to foreign customers, with Taiwan, Vietnam, South Korea, Brazil, and the US threatening or imposing tariffs. The relative oversupply of steel had already drive the Chinese government to signal capacity cuts this year, although the amount was not yet unveiled.

The World Steel Association (worldsteel) publishes its Short-Term Outlook (SRO) for 2022 and 2023. Worldsteel estimates that steel demand will grow by 0.4% in 2022, reaching 1,840.2 million tons after a 2.7% percent increase in 2021. In 2023, steel demand will increase by 2.2% to reach 1,881.4 million tons. Current projections are made against the backdrop of the war in Ukraine and are subject to high uncertainty.