China Trade Data for February
The following table is of the Chinese trade data for the month of February 2013. Tonnage shown is in thousands of metric tons.
Category: Economy
SMU Service Center Inventories
Based on the results from our steel survey conducted this past week, service center inventories dropped to 2.09 months and have been declining over the past couple of months. Steel Market Update does not weigh larger service center results any differently than smaller service centers. We defer to the MSCI data as being more complete. […]
AISI Encourages Congress to Act on Tax Policy, Energy and Currency Manipulation
House Subcommittee Presentations The American Iron and Steel Institute made its presence known last week on Capitol Hill. Top steel executives encouraged members of the House Energy and Commerce subcommittee on Commerce, Manufacturing and Trade to remedy government policies on tax, energy, infrastructure, environment and trade to strengthen American jobs in steel and other manufacturing […]
IHS Global Insight says AEDC Overestimates Benefit of Big River Steel
Nucor pushes back at potential competitor Written by: Sandy Williams Arkansas lawmakers are still delving into the feasibility of offering Big River Steel a $125 million incentive package. IHS Global Analysis was hired by the State of Arkansas to provide a third-party review of the Arkansas Economic Development Commission (AEDC) cost-benefit analysis for the proposed […]
SMU Comparison Price Indices
We had a mixed bag this past week as the CRU indices went higher while SMU and Platts moved lower. Stuck in the middle was Steel Orbis which didn’t do anything and SteelBenchmarker which did not report new numbers last week. The benchmark hot rolled index is in a fairly tight range from $610 (SMU/Steel […]
Industrial Production & Capacity Utilization in “Goldilocks Zone”
Industrial Production and Manufacturing Capacity Utilization – February 2013 Federal Reserve statistics for February 2013 indicate that manufacturing is in a “Warm” growth mode which confirms the Institute of Supply Management’s manufacturing index, orders for durable goods and the rate of growth of manufacturing employment. In three months through February IP grew 2.6% year over […]
AIA Billings Index Shows Strengthening of Construction Sector
Washington, D.C. – March 20, 2013 – With increasing demand for design services, the Architecture Billings Index (ABI) is continuing to strengthen. As a leading economic indicator of construction activity, the ABI reflects the approximate nine to twelve month lag time between architecture billings and construction spending. The American Institute of Architects (AIA) reported the […]