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    Prices

    Comparison Price Indices: Still Bouncing

    Written by John Packard


    Flat rolled steel prices seem to have stabilized, even if there was some see-sawing among the indexes followed by Steel Market Update this past week.

    Benchmark hot rolled prices are hovering close to $630 per ton with SMU ($627.50 per ton), SteelBenchmarker ($627) and Platts ($630) all within $3 per ton of each other.

    Last week Steel Market Update and Platts saw cold rolled at $830 per ton while SteelBenchmarker was $17 per ton lower at $813 per ton.

    SMU saw galvanized at $890 for .060” G90. Our average was up $5 per ton but we don’t think that is an indicator that prices are going higher from here. We believe the market is in a period of stability and prices will bounce up and down depending on the number of data points we are able to collect.

    Galvalume .0142” AZ50, Grade 80 was up $10 on our index but, like galvanized above we do not see this as a rising trend quite yet.

    Plate prices were slightly lower on both Platts ($640) and SteelBenchmarker ($654).

    FOB Points for each index:

    SMU: Domestic Mill, East of the Rockies.
    SteelBenchmarker: Domestic Mill, East of the Mississippi.
    Platts: Northern Indiana Domestic Mill.

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