With the price announcement out of Severstal NA earlier this past week (+$30/ton) we anticipate other flat rolled steel mills to begin advising their customers of any price changes they will be making sometime this week.

Most of the domestic mills have lead times on hot rolled out 4-5 weeks which is an approximate extension of 2 weeks from where the mills were at the very beginning of November. Cold rolled and coated (Galvanized, Galvalume, Aluminized, Galvannealed) lead times are generally into January production and some have moved out as far as early February. This is a clear sign of higher prices and more announcements in the coming weeks – just like last year.

Once purchasing levels are balanced with lead times and inventory levels – which should take approximately 30-45 days, then we will see how supply and demand match up. We will also have a better feel for how drastic weather might play in the supply scenario. Remember last year when we had a couple of outages due to weather related issues…

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