Final Thoughts
Final Thoughts
Written by John Packard
April 8, 2019
A comment from a steel buyer today as we discussed steel prices, “That’s what I like about the steel business, there is always a new dynamic.” Put another way by one of my trading mentors a number of years back, in the steel industry prices are either going up or they are going down, there is no in between. This makes for an interesting business to cover and my days are spent in constant conversation with both buyers and sellers of steel.
On a personal note, one of my neighbors here in Florida lives in Germany and has a company that works with automotive engineers, tool and die makers and fabricators. His company solves the problems being created by the new advanced high-strength steels. We had an interesting conversation about spring-back, forming and the new shapes steel is being asked to make in the new vehicles we (the public) has not seen yet. He told me about the next generation of electric vehicles and how you will be able to use your phone and program in the amount of horsepower you want the car to generate on any specific trip. Going on the Autobahn in Germany? Maybe 500 horsepower is what you want. Driving around town, dial in 200 horsepower. Same car, same engine (electric). He also told me the max weight for an electric vehicle to be effective is 1,500 pounds. I found it interesting. I am trying to get him to commit to speak at one of our future Steel 201 workshops where we focus in on advanced high-strength steels.
Our service center inventories analysis is ongoing and will be completed later this week. We have already informed the data providers of our “Flash” analysis of the data based on approximately 60 percent of the data providers giving us data prior to the end of last week. Currently we are providing data only to the data providers. If you are a service center carrying prime hot rolled, cold rolled, galvanized, Galvalume or plate steels and would like more information about becoming a confidential data provider, please contact me at John@SteelMarketUpdate.com. Please note that we do encourage the use of a non-disclosure agreement, which is signed by Steel Market Update and our parent company the CRU Group.
I noticed that Minnesota is supposed to get one to two feet of snow later this week (there is a reason why I live in Florida these days). I don’t know how much (if any) will be hitting Davenport, Iowa, but I can assure you that it will be gone by the time our next Steel 101 workshop happens on May 14 & 15. I took a quick glance at registrations and noted that the list is heavily weighted to end users (manufacturing companies). I expect by the time we get to the workshop there will be a fair representation of service centers, traders and steel mills in the mix as well. This is one of the advantages our Steel 101 workshop provides to attendees. Besides having instructors who are experienced on the subjects being taught, the opportunity to get the perspectives from manufacturers, steel mills, distributors and others associated with the industry is an invaluable learning experience. For more information, go to www.SteelMarketUpdate.com/Events/Steel101
We keep getting more registrations for the 2019 SMU Steel Summit Conference. I want to mention briefly here that we will be honoring a number of young people for the contributions and creativity they are bringing to their company. We will have more details about what this means, but you can think about the people within your organization as there may be people that are 35 years or younger that are making a significant difference. Nominations will come from people within your company; they can come from people outside of your organization that recognize the strengths of someone they are dealing with or the nomination can come from the individual themselves. Those that are nominated will be eligible to attend the 2019 SMU Steel Summit Conference for $650 rather than our full fare of $1,375. Watch this space for more details.
By the way – should you be having any issues registering for our Steel 101 or SMU Steel Summit Conference, please let us know at info@SteelMarketUpdate.com or events@SteelMarketUpdate.com or you can contact my office at 772-245-8630.
As always, your business is truly appreciated by all of us here at Steel Market Update.
John Packard, President & CEO
John Packard
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