Seamless Steel Pipes & OCTG (API 5CT Casing & Tubing, API 5L, ASTM A106 / A53)

Casing, tubing and seamless line pipe by grade, connection and inspection

Seamless pipe is pierced from a solid round and rolled or extruded to size, so it carries no weld seam, and it is bought where pressure, collapse or sour service rule out a welded tube. Oil country tubular goods (OCTG) are the downhole part of that market: casing and tubing to API Specification 5CT in the grades J55 and K55 for shallow wells, N80 for intermediate strings, L80 with controlled hardness for sour service, and P110 for deep and high-pressure wells. The contract names outside diameter and weight per foot, grade, range length (R1, R2 or R3), end finish (plain end, API threaded and coupled, or a premium connection made under licence from its owner), drift and hydrostatic test, and non-destructive testing to the specification's inspection level. API 5L seamless line pipe is ordered as PSL1 or PSL2 in grades B through X65 and higher, with PSL2 adding tighter chemistry, mandatory Charpy impact testing and traceability, and ASTM A106 Grade B / C and ASTM A53 cover the process and plant piping a refinery or power EPC buys in schedules 40, 80 and XS. Diameter and wall-thickness tolerances are those of the named specification. The mill test certificate is issued to EN 10204 type 3.1, signed by the mill's own inspection department, or type 3.2 where the buyer's or a third party's inspector co-signs it; SGS, Bureau Veritas and TÜV are the usual third-party inspectors for dimensional, visual, NDT and witnessed hydrostatic checks. UN Comtrade 2024 export declarations put seamless tubes and pipes (HS 7304) at USD 24.95 bn, led by China at 28.8%, Japan at 11.1%, Germany at 6.9% and Italy at 6.4%, and the casing-and-tubing subheading 7304.29 at USD 5.60 bn, led by China at 35.1%, Brazil at 10.7%, Japan at 9.8% and Austria at 8.5%.

The buyers are national and independent oil companies and their drilling contractors, EPC contractors on process and pipeline packages, OCTG and pipe stockists in the Gulf, Africa and Asia, and traders filling tender lots. CBIL is a commodity brokerage company and brokers seamless pipe and OCTG from Chinese, Japanese, Italian, German, Indian, Argentine, Mexican and Romanian mills and their distributors to those buyers, against a certificate that states the country where the steel was melted and poured. Trade measures decide which origin lands competitively. From 1 July 2026 Regulation (EU) 2026/1384 replaced the EU steel safeguard with country-allocated annual tariff quotas, administered quarterly, and a 50% out-of-quota duty; since 1 January 2026 the EU CBAM definitive period requires an importer bringing in more than 50 tonnes a year of CBAM goods to be an authorised CBAM declarant and to surrender certificates for the embedded emissions, so the producer's emissions data travels with the pipe. In the United States the Section 232 proclamation effective 8 June 2026 applies 50% to articles entirely or almost entirely of steel, on full customs value, with partner-specific treatment for some origins. The United States has also kept anti-dumping duty orders on OCTG from Argentina and Mexico since November 2022, and Canada reached final anti-dumping determinations in 2026 on OCTG from Korea, Mexico, the Philippines and Türkiye, so the buyer checks the rate for the specific mill and origin at the port of discharge before contracting. Pipe is shipped in hexagonal steel-strapped bundles with thread protectors and end caps: casing and tubing usually breakbulk in Handysize and multipurpose tonnage, where CBIL's chartering desk (LaycanDesk) quotes the freight, and shorter line and process pipe in 40-foot containers or open-tops. Terms are FOB, CFR or CIF, or FCA and DAP for container lots, and prices are negotiated per metric tonne or per metre on grade, size and connection, with published OCTG and line pipe price assessments used as a reference rather than a formula. Send your specification and PSL, grade, OD and wall or weight per foot, range length, end finish or connection, NDT and inspection level, quantity by size and discharge port.

Need the ship as well? Our chartering desk prices steel coil and plates breakbulk freight on LaycanDesk.

Excluded origins are not offered, including product re-exported, blended or re-processed through a third country. Every lot moves with a certificate of origin naming the producing plant, mine or grower country, and nothing is quoted before the seller and loading point are known.