SMU Data and Models
Steel Mills Still Willing to Negotiate Flat Rolled Steel Prices
Written by John Packard
October 20, 2016
The domestic steel mills in North America continue to be willing to negotiate spot steel prices on hot rolled, cold rolled, galvanized and Galvalume products according to those responding to this week’s Steel Market Update flat rolled market trends survey.
It has now been a number of months since the mills were last in a strong negotiating position. Hot rolled is no longer the weakest product as all of the flat rolled products have been bitten by the “let’s make a deal” bug.
Manufacturing companies and service centers reported unanimously that steel mills are willing to negotiate hot rolled spot prices. This has been the case on HRC negotiations since the beginning of September 2016.
Cold rolled is not quite unanimous but with 92 percent of the respondents reporting the mills as willing to negotiate CRC pricing, it might as well be. You have to go back to mid-August to see less than 50 percent of our respondents reporting spot prices as negotiable.
Galvanized is similar to cold rolled with 89 percent of the respondents reporting spot prices as negotiable and Galvalume is close behind with 86 percent. Seasonality is now coming into play with Galvalume which may be one of the reasons for that percentage increasing over the past couple of months.
A side note: The data for both lead times and negotiations comes from only service center and manufacturer respondents. We do not include commentary from the steel mills, trading companies, or toll processors in this particular group of questions.
To see an interactive history of our Steel Mill Negotiations data, visit our website here.
John Packard
Read more from John PackardLatest in SMU Data and Models
SMU Scrap Survey: Current and Future Sentiment tick down
SMU’s Current Sentiment Index for scrap decreased this month, a move mirrored by our Future Sentiment Index, according to the latest data from our ferrous scrap survey.
SMU Survey: Buyers’ Sentiment slips again, future outlook improves
Each of our Sentiment Indices continues to reflect that steel buyers are positive about their present and future business prospects, though that confidence has eased considerably compared to the beginning of the year.
SMU scrap market survey results now available
SMU’s October ferrous scrap market survey results are now available on our website to all premium members.
SMU flat-rolled market survey results now available
SMU’s latest steel buyers market survey results are now available on our website to all premium members.
SMU Survey: Sheet and plate lead times stabilize
Sheet and plate lead times saw minor shifts this week, according to SMU’s latest market survey. Sheet times have inched up over the last month but remain within days of multi-year lows, as they have since May. Plate lead times have bobbed within a tight range for months, hovering roughly a week longer than this time last year.