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    October 15, 2017

    Will Flat Rolled Return to "Normal" Seasonal Price Change?

    Written by John Packard

    One of the questions we get regularly is what are steel buyers and sellers of steel saying about their business (demand) and inventory levels? Over this past week, Steel Market Update spoke with quite a few companies and asked them how they were seeing business and if their company was building flat rolled or steel plate inventories. A number believe flat rolled steel prices will return to their normal seasonal swoon in early fourth quarter, only to rebound when steel mill lead times reach into the New Year.

    As we mentioned in an article published on Thursday, service center inventories rose as of the end of September. SMU Service Center Inventories now average 2.90 months of supply, up from the 2.70 measured at the end of August. (Note: This is a new index where we currently survey 40 service centers at the end of each month in order to get a better feel for inventory levels of flat rolled, as well as the buying trend moving forward.)

    John Packard

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