Final Thoughts
Final Thoughts
Written by John Packard
October 28, 2015
After three days of non-stop packaging followed by 24 hours of non-stop cleaning we have finally departed our Georgia offices and are in transit (as I write) to our new location in Florida. It is a two day trip so if you call our office you may get a voice mail message – my apologies for that. However, we will monitor the phones and our emails and will respond as soon as humanly possible. We will be in our office in Florida on Monday.
If you need to reach me you can also contact me on my cell phone: 770-596-6268.
I have to apologize as one of our contributing writers failed to deliver the HRC Futures article for this evening’s edition of SMU. Andre is on deck for next week and we will be making changes to compliment Andre’s articles in future issues of our newsletter and on the website. The forward curve data has been updated on the website for both HRC and BUS (scrap).
Due to both my travel schedule and that of Lewis Leibowitz we will be addressing the critical circumstances filing on hot rolled coil as well as updating the due dates for AD/CVD announcements.
This area of our newsletter, my “final thoughts” exists so that I have a forum to give my opinion on topics I deem important at that time. Tonight I want to address those of you who are negotiating 2016 contracts – my opinion is now might be an excellent time to cut your deal… In my mind it seems that the market is waiting for the catalyst that will stop the price slide. If scrap bottoms and begin to move higher as we move into the winter months… If US Steel or ArcelorMittal (or both) decide that they have no option but to lockout the USW in order to achieve the concessions needed… If the trade case rulings end up in favor of the domestic steel mills (and end up being large enough to stem the flow of imported steel)… If AK Steel, US Steel and possibly ArcelorMittal take out the capacity being discussed (publically or privately)… If we have a harsh winter which tends to play havoc with those blast furnaces located in the North (as in all of them since USS Fairfield has shut down its blast furnace)…
There are reasons to not wait too long trying to catch the last drop of price erosion (however, others will still say it is never safe to catch a falling knife…).
Just my opinion – I know that all of our readers have opinions of their own. You are welcome to shoot me an email with your thoughts on the subject: John@SteelMarketUpdate.com
Excuse our shorter than normal newsletter today. Those of you that know me well know I will more than make up for it over the coming days…
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!