Final Thoughts
Final Thoughts
Written by John Packard
September 18, 2016
With the Wheatland Tube filing of a complaint against China using the ENFORCE Act we are about to enter the next stage of trade complaints. The Wheatland complaint is for circumvention of duties that already exist against Chinese products, so it will be interesting how quickly this first test case takes and will Customs and Border Protection find in favor of the U.S. manufacturer. We will be watching this closely in the coming weeks (and months).
I believe we have two to maybe up to four seats left for our next Steel 101: Introduction to Steel Making and Market Fundamentals workshop which will be held in Memphis, Tennessee and will include a tour of the brand new Big River Steel (BRS) steel mill. The dates are November 15-16, 2016. You can learn more about the workshop on our website: www.SteelMarketUpdate.com or by contacting our office at 800-432-3475.
A note to those attending FABTECH and/or the ASD Annual Conference both in Las Vegas at the end of that same week as our Steel 101 workshop. John Eckstein (one of our Steel 101 instructors) and I will be teaching a “mini” Steel 101 workshop at the Las Vegas Convention Center as part of FABTECH. Our class will be from 8 AM until 10 AM on Friday, November 18th. I hope to attend at least a portion of the ASD meeting as well.
Brett is on vacation for a couple of days. If you need to reach me you can do so by calling 800-432-3475. If you want to reach Diana (pay a bill or have questions about your account) she can be reached at 772-932-7538.
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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Never have I been more certain in declaring that those in the steel industry are less certain now than they thought they’d be at this point before the election.
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“Trump took to Twitter.” That was a familiar story lead in Trump 1.0. Now it’s “Trump took to Truth Social (or X)." The latest example: President-elect Donald Trump on Monday evening said he was “totally against” U.S. Steel being acquired by Nippon Steel in a post on Truth Social.
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And so it begins (again). Not to be outdone by Thanksgiving, President-elect Donald Trump has threatened to impose tariffs of 25% on all imports from Canada and Mexico. He also threatened to hit all imports from China with tariffs of 10% - an amount that would come on top of a boatload of pre-existing duties and tariffs.
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“We’ll always have Paris,” as the famous line in Casablanca goes. And this month, the global steel industry did as well. The Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) Steel Committee met in the City of Lights earlier this month. There was also a meeting of the Global Forum addressing excess steel capacity.
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It’s once again A Tale of Two Cities in the steel market. Some are almost euphoric about Trump’s victory. Others, some rather bearish, are more focused on the day-to-day market between now and Inauguration Day on Jan. 20.