Several Vietnamese cement suppliers are sold out for much of the year, according to comments made at the Intercem conference in Dubai last week, as stronger domestic and regional demand has limited spot availability.
Securing Vietnamese volumes has now become challenging, one trader said. Higher public spending and residential construction demand in the domestic market has led some Vietnamese sellers to sharply increase export prices since the beginning of this year. Some producers, including Vicem Ha Tien, SCG Vietnam, Insee Vietnam, Fico YTL and Vicem Ha Long, also raised domestic cement prices by around $4/metric tonne (t) in January, according to the Vietnam Chamber of Commerce and Industry. Producers pointed to rising energy and raw material costs as additional factors behind the price adjustments.
Vietnamese cement makers have been increasingly exporting to the US and other markets over the past five years because of excess supply after Chinese demand declined. The country delivered its first 122,300t to the US in 2019 and increased supply steadily to 4.47mn t in 2025, up from 1.12mn t in 2020.
This cement has traditionally been offered at a significant discount to other origins such as Turkey. In recent months, Vietnamese cement has been offered at around $75-$85/t cfr US Gulf coast, compared with $90/t cfr or higher for Turkish cement. Fob prices were heard in the high $30s/t, although one US buyer heard fob prices significantly higher than this, potentially because sellers do not have excess tonnes for export.
Although Vietnamese cement makers have room to boost exports, with most plants operating at just 60-80pc utilization and installed cement capacity exceeding 120mn t, producers remain primarily focused on the domestic market and only export surplus volumes, a market participant said.
Lower exports from Vietnam to the US are likely to support demand for Turkish supply, which is expected to rely more heavily on the US market after the EU implemented its Carbon Border Adjustment Mechanism (CBAM) this year. The CBAM policy imposes a cost on imports to the EU from outside the region and could lead Turkish sellers to redirect much of the roughly 3mn t they supplied to the EU in 2025.
Cement offers from Turkey to the US have already increased since the start of this year because of reduced competition from Vietnam and as CBAM "limits shipments to Europe", the trader said.
