Final Thoughts
Final Thoughts
Written by John Packard
June 19, 2015
I will be in my office all week (yea!) this week. This is probably the first time I have spent a full week behind my desk in the last couple of months. If you have any questions for me this is a good week to track me down and ask away….
I would like to take a moment to thank Ira Kreft, Mary Blizzard and all of the good people at the Bank of America Merrill Lynch offices in Chicago for allowing me to speak to a number of their clients this past week.
I also want to thank the Association of Steel Distributors for hosting Ray Culley and myself at their Chicago regional meeting. I am quite certain that we will see a number of the ASD membership at our Steel Summit Conference in Atlanta on September 1st and 2nd.
We have a new writer who will be splitting the duties of writing about hot rolled coil (HRC) futures, busheling (BUS) futures and iron ore trading. We want to welcome Spencer Johnson who is a risk management consultant in ferrous and base metals with FC Stone, LLC. If you have any questions you would like Andre Marshall of Crunch Risk, LLC or Spencer Johnson to tackle, please send them to: info@SteelMarketUpdate.com.
Registration is open for our next Steel 101: Introduction to Steel Making & Market Fundamentals workshop which will be held in Davenport, Iowa and will include a tour of the SSAB mini-mill (EAF). Information is on our website or you are free to contact me in my office with any questions that you might have. Steel Market Update member companies receive special discounts on this (and all) workshop as well as our Steel Summit Conference. The dates on the Steel 101 workshop in Iowa are October 6-7, 2015.
If you are currently on a free trial to our newsletter and would like to learn more about becoming a member (subscriber) please feel free to contact me at 800-432-3475 or by email: John@SteelMarketUpdate.com. We very much would like to earn your business.
As always your business is truly appreciated by all of us here at Steel Market Update.
John Packard, Publisher
John Packard
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Final thoughts
SMU has heard from some larger buyers who have stepped back into the market to buy at prices that, if not at a bottom, they assess to be close to one. Is it enough to stretch out lead times and send prices upward again? Or do we continue to scrape along the mid-$600s per short ton (st) as we have been doing for most of the last month?
Final thoughts
Cleveland-Cliffs Chairman, President and CEO Lourenco Goncalves had some insightful things to say today about the steel market and about a conference we suspect might be Steel Summit.
Final thoughts
They say a picture is worth a thousand words. Well, when you add in some commentary from respected peers in the steel industry to those pictures, that may shoot you up to five thousand words, at least. In that spirit, we’ve added some snapshots from our market survey this week, along with some comments from market participants.
Final thoughts
I thought we’d have more clarity this week on Section 232, Mexico, and a potential carve-out for steel melted and poured in Brazil. As of right now, the only official comment I have is from the Office of the United States Trade Representative (USTR).
Final thoughts
There are just 40 days left until the 2024 SMU Steel Summit gets underway on Aug. 26 at the Georgia International Convention Center (GICC) in Atlanta. And I’m pleased to announce that it's official now: More than 1,000 people have registered to at attend! Another big development: The desktop version of the networking app for the event has officially launched!