Steel company Arcelor, the world's largest steel maker, expects 2004 profits to be similar to last year's results, the company's Vice President Alain Davezac said on Wednesday.
"This year's profit is going to be in line with that of 2003," Davezac said at a metals conference in Moscow.
Asked whether steel prices were likely to continue to rise, he said: "Yes, until the end of this year and I hope they will increase".
Davezac said earlier in a presentation to the conference that he believed the Russian steel industry was ripe for consolidation but he ruled out the possibility of Arcelor buying equity stakes in Russian companies for the time being.
"The picture is that there are only four or five leaders which control about 75 percent of the steel business and a myriad of small operators".
Arcelor, which already operates a joint venture with Russian steel group Severstal, also ruled out any further partnerships in Russia, he added.
"For the time being we are not considering anything. We are not considering or discussing anything with anyone," said Davezac. "For the time being we are structuring our partnership with Severstal".
Due to peculiarities of the local market, acquisitions and mergers were probably not the most likely scenario, he said. Joint ventures were the most likely form of industry consolidation.
"There is very large room and much scope for setting up joint ventures between Russian firms and between Russian and foreign firms," said Davezac.
In the long run, industry would develop to the point where it would be dominated by two big steel companies. He did not say how long he thought the consolidation process would take.
He said the Russian steel industry is attractive for two reasons: "access to raw materials and low costs".
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