SMU Survey: Most buyers say mills are open to negotiating prices

More than nine out of every ten steel buyers polled by SMU this week reported that mills are willing to negotiate prices for new orders. Negotiation rates have risen in each of our last three surveys, following an early-June lull, and reached record highs this week.

Every other week, SMU polls thousands of buyers to ask if domestic mills are open to negotiating prices on new spot orders. This week, 95% of respondents said mills were willing to talk price to secure an order, up 10 percentage points from our previous survey, to the highest rate seen in our 13-year data history (Figure 1).