Commercial Metals Co. navigated through third quarter FY 2020 pandemic challenges with almost no disruption to operations or loss of productivity, achieving net sales of $1.34 billion and earnings of $64.2 million Barbara Smith, chairman of the board, president and CEO, commented, “While the effects of the COVID-19 crisis impacted our business throughout the third […]
U.S. Steel plans to indefinitely reduce operations of the pickle line, cold mill and finishing division at Great Lakes Works in Ecorse, Mich. The action is separate from the indefinite idling of ironmaking, steelmaking and hot strip rolling mill facilities announced in December 2019. The company said in a June 8 letter to the Michigan […]
Big River Steel (BRS) expects to complete its capacity expansion by the end of this year more than two months ahead of expectations. The mill in Osceola, Ark., is in the process of doubling its annual steel production capacity from 1.65 million to 3.3 million tons. BRS began operations at its $1.3 billion scrap metal […]
EVRAZ NA will reduce its workforce by an additional 65 employees at EVRAZ Oregon Steel as operations are idled in response to weak demand due to the coronavirus. In a Worker Adjustment and Retraining Notification to the state of Oregon, EVRAZ said it “has experienced a significant business downturn” and will permanently reduce the workforce […]
U.S. Steel has restarted its No. 1 blast furnace at Edgar Thomson, part of Mon Valley Works. The furnace was idled on April 30 along with the Gary Works No. 6 furnace. Said U.S. Steel spokesperson Meghan Cox: “As we continue to navigate business conditions during the worldwide COVID-19 pandemic, we are adjusting to changing […]
Cleveland-Cliffs will resume construction on its Hot-Briquetted Iron plant in Toledo earlier than expected. Construction was halted on March 20, 2020, due to the pandemic, but will resume with newly implemented safety measures. Cleveland-Cliffs plans to complete the HBI facility during the fourth quarter of this year. The Tilden mine that supplies AK Steel Middletown […]
By CRU Senior Analyst Erik Hedborg, from CRU’s Steelmaking Raw Materials Monitor The suspension of iron ore production at Vale’s Itabira Complex resulted in prices surging after the weekend. On Tuesday, June 9, CRU has assessed the 62% Fe fines price at $105.0 /dmt, up $4.5 /dmt w/w. In China, demand has remained robust as […]
China’s steel exports in May decline by 23.3 percent compared with May 2019 to about 4.4 million tons. Global demand for Chinese steel products remains weak as economic activity around the world is hampered by the coronavirus. “Customers in each country are losing their willingness to buy,” said a Steel Market Update source in the […]
By CRU Analyst Iris Speelmanns, from CRU’s Global Steel Trade Service The spread of Covid-19 has resulted in an annualized loss of 284 Mt of steel capacity outside China. Slowly easing lockdown measures in most regions have allowed for the resumption of some industrial activities and steel producers in some countries are restarting their operations, […]
By CRU Prices Analyst George Pearson, from CRU’s Steel Monitor Sheet prices in the U.S. Midwest market have continued to rise with HR coil assessed at $510 /s.ton, a w/w gain of $23 /s.ton. While prices are higher, overall volume of transactions has been limited. This is due not only to low demand and plentiful […]
Gerdau has partnered with 174 Power Global to develop one of the largest behind-the-meter solar facilities in the nation. The companies have signed a 20-year power purchase agreement that will develop an 80-megawatt solar project adjacent to the Gerdau Midlothian Steel mill in Midlothian, Texas. An array of more than 231,00 solar panels, spanning 700 […]
By CRU Analysts Alexander Ordosch and Iris Speelmanns, from CRU’s Steel Sheet Products Monitor: The Covid-19 crisis has resulted in a rapid fall in market activity and steel demand, which has resulted in steelmakers across the globe responding quickly by lowering steel production. Steelmakers have two options to reduce steel output in response to lower […]
Olympic Steel is expanding its southeastern footprint with the opening of a new 120,000-square-foot metal processing facility in Buford, Ga., that will act as a primary flat rolled fabrication hub for the region, which also includes facilities in Locust, N.C., Winder, Ga.; and Hanceville, Ala. Olympic Steel’s facilities in the Southeast offer a wide array […]
Algoma Steel welcomed a decision by the Canada Border Services Agency (CBSA) to initiate an antidumping investigation regarding hot-rolled heavy steel plate exported from Chinese Taipei, Germany, South Korea, Malaysia and Turkey. Algoma submitted a complaint to CBSA on April 6, 2020, alleging that the goods indicated were illegally dumped, causing injury to Canadian producers […]
By CRU Analyst Nikki Ni, from CRU’s Steel Monitor Over the past month, Chinese steel demand has accelerated, resulting in lower inventories while output remained at a high level. The ongoing demand recovery has improved the Steel PMI to 45.9 in April, up by 3.7pp m/m. Despite being below the 50-mark, the consecutive m/m improvement […]
U.S. Steel announced a four-year agreement to sell a “substantial volume” of iron ore pellets to Algoma Steel in Ontario, Canada. The purchase agreement runs from 2021 through 2024 and provides a new long-term customer for U.S. Steel’s Minnesota mines. Monday’s announcement follows an iron ore purchase agreement with Stelco in April that gives Stelco […]
Wholesalers of HVAC products for the construction market report surprisingly strong sales given the coronavirus situation, but also concerns about construction demand in the second half when current work is completed and there are fewer new projects in the pipeline. In a conference call this morning, members of the Heating, Air Conditioning & Refrigeration Distributors […]
Wholesalers of HVAC products have weathered the pandemic surprisingly well so far and are more concerned about construction demand months from now than they are about their near-term prospects. Consider what has happened since April as a result of the market’s response to the virus: Steel mills are operating at just above 50 percent of […]
By CRU Economist Anissa Chabib, from CRU’s Economic Outlook On May 8, the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics released the official U.S. unemployment data for April. Unemployment increased to 14.7 percent from 4.4 percent in March. This is the highest rate and the largest month-on-month increase in the history of the series, which was created […]
Cleveland-Cliffs expects operations to normalize during the second quarter as end-markets begin recovering from the COVID-19 pandemic. “Although the pandemic effect led to automotive plant shutdowns over the past six weeks, the timing and pace of production restarts as well as consumer sales data have both exceeded our expectations,” said Cliffs’ Chairman, President and CEO […]
By CRU Senior Consultants Amir Sabet and Josefa Carrere, from CRU’s Steelmaking Raw Materials Monitor The Covid-19 pandemic has generated significant uncertainty in the commodities market. For the steel sector, this has resulted in a fall in demand and steelmakers have responded by taking a wide range of capacity-related actions. In this Insight we show […]
Tenaris announced it will reduce the workforce at its Bay City tubular mill by 200 employees. “We have an unexpected combination of events straining U.S. and global markets—a drastic drop in demand caused by the pandemic and an oversupply triggered by the price war between Russia and Saudi Arabia. In these stark conditions, we must […]
International steelmaker ArcelorMittal was hit particularly hard by the pandemic, dealing with closures and economic recessions across the globe. The company reported a loss of $1.1 billion for the first quarter of 2020 and expects the remainder of the year to be challenging. “There are still too many uncertainties to accurately predict what the rest […]
Ryerson CEO Eddie Lehner says the last three months have felt like three separate years due to the shock of the COVID-19 pandemic: BCV (Before the Coronavirus), DCV (During the Coronavirus) and ACV (After the Coronavirus). After a slow start to January due to weak demand from OEMs, the quarter gave way to a “pandemic […]
Canadian steelmaker Stelco sold out its mill and shipped to capacity despite the coronavirus pandemic in the first quarter of 2020. CEO Alan Kestenbaum attributes a higher value mix, excellent service to customers and a tremendously loyal customer base for its ability to fill order books when competitors are struggling. The company shipped 621,000 net […]
By CRU Research Manager Paul Butterworth and Analyst Alexander Ordosch, from CRU’s Global Steel Trade Service The global Covid-19 outbreak has resulted in sharply falling steel demand all over the world. For the steel industry, it is a challenging task to reduce production levels as ~75 percent of global output is produced through the BF/BOF, […]
A significant development in Sweden may allow a cleaner, more environmentally friendly way to heat steel in the future. Steelmaker Ovako and its partner Linde Gas AB have successfully completed a full-scale trial using hydrogen to heat steel before rolling. In trials at its Hofors rolling mill, the company said it proved that the heating […]
U.S. Steel remains focused on its acquisition of Big River Steel even as the COVID-19 crisis forces the idling of U.S Steel operations and layoffs of employees. The success of U.S. Steel depends on having the best of integrated and EAF steelmaking, said the company during its first-quarter earnings call. “Make no mistake, our ‘best […]
Olympic Steel said it is weathering the COVID-19 crisis well, managing to earn a profit and supplying metals to essential industries making products for health care, transportation and food service markets. “We are sure to face some difficult times ahead, but we have weathered challenges and cyclical downturns throughout our history,” said CEO Rick Marabito […]
Canadian steel mill Stelco has entered into a new eight-year pellet sale and purchase agreement with U.S. Steel. The eight-year contract runs until Jan. 31, 2028, and will provide 100 percent of Stelco’s iron ore pellet requirements at Lake Erie Works including volume required to support the expansion in production projected after the upcoming blast […]