JSW Steel USA broke ground Friday in Baytown, Texas, on what it claims will be the most technologically advanced electric arc furnace, slab caster and plate mill in the world. It will be the only melt and manufacture plate mill with a contiguous pipe mill in North America, the company said. Thanks to policies from […]
I will be in Houston, Texas, on Wednesday and Thursday of this week as I am speaking to two groups, the Industrial Packaging Alliance of North America (IPANA) and the Reusable Industrial Packaging Association (RIPA). Member companies are producers and re-conditioners of a wide range of industrial packaging including steel, plastic and fiber drums, as […]
Manufacturing activity in New York State continues to be strong, according to the October 2018 Empire State Manufacturing Survey published by the Federal Reserve Bank of New York. The general business conditions index rose two points to 21.1 due to a jump in new orders and shipments. The new orders index leapt six points, while […]
Material Sciences Corporation has joined the North American Steel Alliance. MSC becomes the 121st member of NASA, a purchasing cooperative based in Chicago. MSC provides advanced solutions in metals, metal products and metal processing across a diverse array of end-use markets. Its specialties include electrogalvanizing, continuous coil-coating, laminating, acoustic composites and supply chain management. “One […]
The International Monetary Fund, which updates its World Economic Outlook each April and October, has made a downward revision to its forecast for global GDP growth in 2018 and 2019. On Oct. 9, the IMF published the following: “The latest World Economic Outlook report projects that global growth will remain steady over 2018–19 at last […]
Economic indicators of manufacturing activity remain strong. This report summarizes 10 data sources that describe the state of manufacturing in the United States. We have reported on most of these separately and therefore will be brief in this summary. We don’t expect these data sources to all point in the same direction. Our intent in […]
Alro Steel has acquired two Missouri service centers, extending its reach further west. Alro has purchased the assets of Sedalia Steel Supply, Sedalia, Mo., and Camdenton Steel Supply, Camdenton, Mo. Established in 1976 by Wayne and Gayle Lamb, Sedalia Steel Supply distributes a complete line of steel products from a 107,000-square-foot facility in Sedalia and […]
Union Partners has acquired the assets of Xcel Steel’s pickling operations in Dearborn, Mich., effective Oct. 5. The division has joined Union Partners-owned Maksteel and will now operate under the name Maksteel Processing. As this transition occurs, there will be no interruption in service to customers, the company said. The Detroit location of Xcel Steel Processing will continue […]
Prices for secondary steel have followed the downtrend with prime, but to a lesser degree, report distributors of nonprime material. Finding enough material to meet customers’ needs remains a challenge, they say. Secondary steel is nonprime or excess material that did not meet the specifications for its original intended use, but is acceptable to other […]
The employment situation in the United States is excellent and continues to improve. Rising employment and wages are the main contributors to GDP growth because personal consumption accounts for almost 70 percent of GDP. Steel consumption is related to GDP; therefore, this is one of the indicators that helps us understand the reality of the […]
Indicators of economic activity in the U.S. do not predict a recession any time soon, but the yield curve should be on your radar screen. Once every three months, the Steel Market Update staff tries to gain insight into the timing of the next recession. Economists consider recessions to be a necessary evil to clear […]
As of August, the U.S. economy had grown for 112 months in a row, the second longest growth streak in history. How much longer can that trend possibly continue? Is a recession inevitable? Not any time soon, predicts Lisa Morrison, Principal Economist for the CRU Group. Speaking at the CRU North American Steel Conference this […]
In the cyclic environment of the steel industry, the best time to sell your company is when you are at the top of your game, said Vincent Pappalardo and Justin Wolfort of advisory firm Brown, Gibbons Lang & Co. Addressing service center executives at the Association of Steel Distributors regional meeting last week in Cleveland, […]
Manufacturing expanded in September, according to the latest Manufacturing ISM Report on Business. The headline PMI posted at 59.8 percent, well over the neutral point of 50.0, but fell 1.3 percent from August. “Export orders expanded, but four major industries are no longer contributing. Price pressure continues, but the index softened for the fourth straight […]
The slowdown for global manufacturing continued in September, according to the latest J.P. Morgan Global Manufacturing PMI. The headline PMI fell to a 22-month low at 52.2, down from 52.6 in August. The PMI has been above the 50.0 neutral mark since March 2016, but has declined in each of the past five months. Output […]
The Association of Women in the Metal Industries (AWMI) will host its annual conference Nov. 7-9 at the Don Cesar in St. Pete Beach, Fla. This year’s schedule of events includes an educational tour of Chromalloy Castings on Wednesday, leadership trainings on Thursday and a dinner cruise on Friday evening. Mary Lindsey, Senior Vice President […]
Despite moderating prices, the outlook for the U.S. steel market is generally favorable for 2019, reported Josh Spoores, CRU Principal Analyst for North America, during a CRU Webinar on Friday. The Trump administration’s Section 232 steel tariff has limited competition from steel imports this year. Steel sheet arrivals into the U.S. are down 12 percent […]
The month of September saw steel prices continue a steady decline that began in August. Steel Market Update data in the table below shows the benchmark hot rolled price slid from more than $900 per ton in the summer to the current price around $854. The same for cold rolled, which went from $1,000 a […]
Members of the Precision Metalforming Association are expecting business conditions to remain steady for the rest of the year. A survey of 110 metalforming companies in the U.S. and Canada showed 28 percent of participants believe economic activity will improve, 62 percent expect no change (same as last month) and 10 percent expect a decline […]
The Chicago Business Barometer dropped to a five-month low in September, sliding down 3.2 points to 60.4. Production and new orders continued solid growth in September, but softened to a six-month low for production and a five-month low for orders. Output and weaker demand was noted by some firms, although many continue to outperform their […]
U.S. Steel is not opening eight new steel plants. No matter how many times President Trump claims that they are. In a wide-ranging press conference this week in advance of the hearing of Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh, President Trump commented on a number of issues including the economy and his steel tariffs. Once again, […]
Aircraft and defense drove a 4.5 percent increase in new orders for durable goods in August, exceeding economists’ expectations. Aircraft orders jumped 69.1 percent and defense orders surged 44.4 percent last month. Orders for autos and parts, however, fell 1.0 percent. When removing transportation from the mix, orders rose a much softer 0.1 percent. Core […]
PTC Alliance has reached a new four-year labor agreement with union workers at its Alliance, Ohio, plant. PTC Alliance manufactures welded and cold drawn mechanical steel tubing. The company employs about 220 workers covered by the Steelworkers contract, signed Sept. 23. Terms of the pact were not disclosed. The company’s relations with the union have […]
I am a new subscriber to your newsletter, but I’m not new to manufacturing. Most of my career was spent working at a medium-sized machining company located in the Southeast, which specialized in production machining mainly to support automotive companies and other assembly plants in the United States. Over the past three decades, I have […]
Support for the Trump administration tariffs on Chinese imports extends across party lines to a majority of voters, according to a recent survey sponsored by the Alliance for American Manufacturing, a non-partisan partnership between American manufacturers and the United Steelworkers. The poll of 1,200 likely voters in the November election showed that 63 percent support […]
The following Trade Policy & Economic Briefing was authored by CRU Principal Economist Lisa Morrison Since March 2018, there has been a broad strengthening of the U.S. dollar. This has developed because of rising U.S. interest rates and strong U.S. economic growth, which is in relative contrast to continued, historically low Eurozone interest rates […]
In the last month, eight of the 16 currencies that Steel Market Update tracks were down against the dollar and eight were up. This was a dramatic change from the May-August period when few of the 16 appreciated against the dollar (just one in May, two in June, three in July and two in August). […]
Global economic expansion may have reached its peak as trade tensions pressure markets, says a new report by the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development. OECD is projecting global GDP growth will settle at 3.7 percent in 2018 in its Interim Economic Outlook. “Amidst rising trade tensions and heightened trade policy uncertainty, global trade growth […]
The Empire State Manufacturing Index slid seven points in September from its 10-month high in August. The general business conditions index showed a slower pace of growth with a reading of 19.0 for the month, below economists’ expectations of 23. New orders and shipments continued to expand but at a softer rate, falling 0.6 points […]
This article is regularly published for our Premium users, but we decided to share it with our entire readership this month. If you are interested in upgrading to a Premium subscription, contact us at info@SteelMarketUpdate.com or 800-432-3475. Carbon steel tubular products have a rate of price escalation much higher than plastic products. This is also […]