Final Thoughts
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Final Thoughts
Written by John Packard
November 17, 2017
We asked a question about Section 232 in last week’s flat rolled steel market trends questionnaire. The question was, “Do you think President Trump will invoke Section 232 and add duties on steel imports early next year on national security grounds?”
Relatively few steel buyers elected to answer this question, which either suggests they don’t have enough information to form an opinion, or they’ve grown tired of all the speculation and have moved on. The administration promised a decision back in June, then postponed it in the face of strong opposition from steel-consuming industries. The delay opened the door to a surge of imports and made the issue of unfair foreign competition worse. The Commerce Department has until Jan. 18 to get its recommendation on the president’s desk, then he has 90 days to make a decision.
But three revealing comments offered by questionnaire respondents clearly state the prevailing views on Section 232:
1) The president will act on Section 232 and it will trigger a trade war and make U.S. metal users less competitive worldwide.
2) The president will certainly do something, but it may be more of a token gesture.
3) The president has too many other issues to deal with.
In any case, the clock is ticking, and we’ll all know soon.
Tim Triplett helped with the Final Thoughts this evening with the Section 232 information shown above.
Another note regarding our publishing schedule over the upcoming Thanksgiving Holiday here in the United States. SMU will publish as normal on Tuesday of this week. We will be closed for Thanksgiving and will not publish on Thursday. Our expectation is that we will publish our newsletter on Sunday, Nov. 26.
During the Thanksgiving Holiday, our website designers will be upgrading our website and improving our mobile application. The website is expected to be down for maintenance late on Wednesday and through Thursday. We expect it to be back online on Friday, Nov. 24.
I will be speaking at the HARDI Annual Conference on Dec. 5 in Las Vegas. I will be at the conference beginning on Sunday evening, Dec. 3 and will return to my office late in the day on Dec. 6.
As always, your business is truly appreciated by all of us here at Steel Market Update.
John Packard, Publisher
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John Packard
Read more from John PackardLatest in Final Thoughts
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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?
![](https://www.steelmarketupdate.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/images/Featured_News_Icons/gears.png)
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.
![](https://www.steelmarketupdate.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/images/Featured_News_Icons/gears.png)
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.
![](https://www.steelmarketupdate.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/images/Featured_News_Icons/gears.png)
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).
![](https://www.steelmarketupdate.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/11/SMU-Steel-Summit.png)
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!