Friday was a sad day at Sparrows Point as the dismantling of the facility took on the BOF (basic oxygen furnace). There was a controlled demolition of the BOF on Friday. Essentially, this leaves only the blast furnace to be destroyed. One of our instructors who lives close to the Sparrows Point facility told us […]
The Steel Market Update Price MoMo Index for flat rolled steel in the U.S remained negative this week for the 9th consecutive week after being in positive territory for the prior 15 weeks. MoMo, a trailing indicator, is measured as a percentage and shows the relation of the current hot rolled coil (HRC) price movements […]
When I last wrote my final thoughts, I had just discovered that my passport had expired ten days earlier and I was scheduled to speak to the Toronto Steel Buyers & Associates dinner in Canada the following day. My efforts to have the passport renewed in Atlanta were rebuffed and I was down to my […]
I have been asked about the rumor mill surrounding coated products and especially the Asian 4 exporting countries. The Asian 4 are: China, India, Taiwan and South Korea. Steel Market Update is aware that at least one mill has been pushing for dumping suits on coated products. We understand that not all mills favor the […]
A few months ago I wrote a series of articles on coil coated painted steel. In the last week, the main suppliers of paint for this industry in the US have all announced price increases. I thought it might be a good time for a few follow up articles. Buyers of coil coated painted steel […]
Editor’s note: Leading paint suppliers have announced price increases effective in January, which will impact the market for prepainted steel and aluminum (see related article). The following SMU Steel Buyers Basics article authored by Mario Briccetti and reprinted from March 2014 explains how the cost of the paint calculates into the cost of prepainted products. […]
I want to take a moment to thank the Association of Steel Distributors (ASD) and their new organization president, Brian Robbins, for the opportunity to speak to the organization at their annual meeting held in Orlando over the past few days. The conference covered a wide variety of topics including the award for Steel Man […]
The possibility for steel prices to have, at the very least, bottomed and improving weather conditions across the United States and Canada have sparked an improvement in our Steel Market Update (SMU) Steel Buyers Sentiment Index. The index, which has been monitoring buyers and sellers of flat rolled steel since 2008, was reported earlier today […]
Steel Market Update began our latest analysis of the flat rolled steel market on Monday of this week. We found mill lead times remained very similar to those reported at the beginning of March. The ArcelorMittal flat rolled steel price announcement was not made until late Monday afternoon and by then 50 percent of the […]
As mentioned in the Lead Times article, SMU began the process of analyzing the flat rolled steel market early on Monday morning – prior to any flat rolled price increase announcements being made. More than likely the survey results regarding mill negotiations represented by the graphic below are going to have about half the respondents […]
The Steel Market Update Price MoMo Index for flat rolled steel in the U.S remained negative this week for the 8th consecutive week after being in positive territory for the prior 15 weeks. MoMo, a trailing indicator, is measured as a percentage and shows the relation of the current hot rolled coil (HRC) price movements […]
Hello from Orlando where the weather is sunny with temperatures in the low 80’s… Come to think of it I believe today is the first day of spring – and it couldn’t have come at a better time. One of the complaints being picked up in this week’s steel survey has been the impact the […]
Based on the most recent MSCI flat rolled steel data Steel Market Update has calculated that U.S. service centers dwindled their “Excess” inventories from +150,000 tons at the end of January to +28,000 tons at the end of February. Our forecast from last month was for service center excess to drop to +80,900 tons. So, […]
A busy past 24 hours in the steel industry as the steel mills begin to make moves to stop the downward spiral in prices. As is our norm, Steel Market Update adjusted our SMU Price Momentum Indicator from Lower to Neutral. This is something we have done when the steel mills as a group go […]
The indexes are beginning to spread out, especially on benchmark hot rolled coil pricing. Steel Market Update saw HRC prices down $15 per ton this past week, SteelBenchmarker was $16 per ton lower (but they only produce prices twice per month), CRU down $5 and Platts held the line even with the previous week. The […]
I once asked a friend, who works for a large steel mill, how many different grades of steel they produced – he estimated the number at 1,000! On top of that, each grade can come in any gauge, any width and many may be coated. Mills make an almost unlimited number of different individual types […]
Tomorrow is St. Patrick’s Day – it is also the beginning of the Steel Market Update flat rolled steel market analysis for mid-March. Invitations should be out around 8 AM ET. If you receive one please take a few minutes to click on the link contained in the email and respond to our questionnaire. John […]
The Steel Market Update Price MoMo Index for flat rolled steel in the U.S remained negative this week for the 7th consecutive week after being in positive territory for the prior 15 weeks. MoMo, a trailing indicator, is measured as a percentage and shows the relation of the current hot rolled coil (HRC) price movements […]
One of our readers sent me an article produced by another steel-related publication about the state of Kentucky offering financial incentives to AK Steel. The Kentucky Industrial Revitalization Act is being extended with one of the hopes that AK Steel will use the incentives to help reline the Ashland blast furnace. The question asked by […]
For our Premium Level members – we should have a special Premium Supplemental newsletter for you by Wednesday afternoon. In it will be an article on currency values and changes and their impact on the market as well as our imports by product, port and country. We will be including slabs in our import by […]
In an earlier article I talked about price risk in steel and several strategies to hedge that risk. Another, perhaps more important, steel buyer risk is continuity of supply. Steel making is a difficult and dangerous activity, and a global one. Unfortunately suppliers often make (and don’t catch) unusable product. Also, every year there seems […]
We haven’t given up on our goal to broaden the perspectives of our readers through the use of our website. The most effective way to understand and expand ones knowledge of the industry is to interact with the news, trends and issues of the industry as they happen. This cannot be done effectively through the […]
On Monday of this week, Steel Market Update (SMU) began our early March flat rolled steel market analysis. We sent invitations to just under 600 companies associated with the industry. Of the companies responding 44 percent were manufacturing companies (end users), 40 percent were steel service centers/wholesalers (distributors), trading companies represented 6 percent of the […]
Buyers and sellers of flat rolled steel continue to be optimistic regarding business prospects both in the current market environment as well as looking out 3 to 6 months into the future. Even so, our index was 2 points lower than the +39 measured during the middle of February and at +37 is the lowest […]
Domestic mill lead times continue to be better than they were at this time last year. Hot rolled lead times averaged 3.94 weeks, according to our survey respondents. This is better than the 3.28 week average of one year ago. Cold rolled lead times were reported to be at an average of 6.08 weeks (4.65 […]
On Monday of this week Steel Market Update sent invitations to just under 600 companies to participate in our flat rolled steel market survey. The respondents to our survey consist of manufacturing companies (44 percent of the respondents), service centers/wholesalers (41 percent) and trading companies (6 percent), with the balance being steel mills, toll processors […]
The Steel Market Update Price MoMo Index for flat rolled steel in the U.S remained negative this week for the 6th consecutive week after being in positive territory for the prior 15 weeks. MoMo, a trailing indicator, is measured as a percentage and shows the relation of the current hot rolled coil (HRC) price movements […]
Scrap prices in Detroit, Carolinas and Alabama have settled lower for March delivery according to SMU sources. Detroit ferrous scrap prices were reported to be down $20 per gross ton while the Carolinas were down $15-$20 and Alabama down $15 per gross ton. The main issue continues to be the lack of a firm scrap […]
Steel Market Update (SMU) began collecting responses for the mid-February flat rolled steel market survey during the week of February 17th. Even with weather related issues being felt around the country, our Buyers Sentiment Index was measured at a robust +39 at that time. That result was one point lower than from our last measurement […]
The Steel Market Update Price MoMo Index for flat rolled steel in the U.S remained negative this week for the 5th consecutive week after being in positive territory for the prior 15 weeks. MoMo, a trailing indicator, is measured as a percentage and shows the relation of the current hot rolled coil (HRC) price movements […]