Anxiety reigns supreme in the flat rolled steel industry as both buyers and sellers grapple with the unknowns brought on by the Section 232 investigation. One area of concern is how service centers are handling spot sales to their end user customers. In the flat rolled steel market trends analysis we performed last week, we […]
U.S. raw steel production totaled 1,718,000 net tons for the week ending June 10, a decline of 2.1 percent from the same period last year, and down 1.8 percent from the previous week. The mill capacity utilization rate was 73.7 percent, down from 75.0 percent a week ago, estimates the American Iron & Steel Institute […]
We believe that misinformation (or a lack of) about regional import volumes is often used to influence purchase decisions. Our intent with this analysis of tonnage by district of entry is to describe in detail what is going on in a company’s immediate neighborhood and thus provide a negotiating advantage for our premium subscribers. We […]
The final license data for May was reported by the Steel Import Monitoring and Analysis system of the U.S. Commerce Department on June 6. An explanation of the methodology that SMU uses to analyze the trade data is given at the end of this piece. All volumes in this analysis are reported in short tons. […]
About 65 percent of respondents to SMU’s June 5 Steel Buyers Sentiment Index questionnaire predict steel mills will not be able to collect the full $30 per ton flat rolled steel price increase announced last week, while just 35 percent believe the hike will stick. Nearly two out of three respondents, mostly service centers and […]
The slide in flat rolled steel prices was curtailed compared to previous weeks as prices on hot rolled, cold rolled, galvanized, Galvalume moved sideways to slightly lower while plate was sideways to slightly higher. All of the major flat rolled steel mills in the United States announced flat rolled price increases on Monday and Tuesday […]
Ferrous scrap pricing has solidified in most regions of the United States east of the Rocky Mountains. Scrap prices traded sideways (remained the same as last month) on prime grades such as bundles and busheling. Otherwise, shredded and obsolete grades saw declines of $10 to $15 per gross ton, according to Steel Market Update (SMU) […]
The following article on the hot rolled coil (HRC) steel and financial futures markets was written by Jack Marshall of Crunch Risk LLC. Here is how Jack saw trading over the past week: Steel This week we had a big reversal/correction week on week as HR futures curve prices traded higher as buyers reached for […]
All of the major flat rolled steel producers have approached their customers and advised them of their intention to increase hot rolled, cold rolled, galvanized and Galvalume prices by a minimum of $30 per ton. As of this evening (Tuesday, June 6, 2017) we have seen price announcements out of California Steel Industries, USS Posco […]
Flat rolled prices were mixed this week as the domestic steel mills announced their $30 per ton price increase and steel buyers placed whatever orders they were allowed to under the existing pricing agreements. We saw a tightening of the range on hot rolled while cold rolled was unchanged, galvanized was down $5 per ton, […]
Over the course of the day today (Tuesday, June 6, 2017) Steel Market Update (SMU) spent time communicating with top executives at some of the largest flat rolled steel service centers in the United States about the steel price increase announcements and about the market as it exists right now. Four service center presidents responded […]
Total U.S. raw steel production for the first five months of the year increased by 2.8 percent, to 37,117,000 million tons, reports the American Iron & Steel Institute (AISI) in Washington. The mill capacity utilization rate for the year averaged 74.4 percent, up from 72.1 percent in the year-ago period. For the week ending June […]
With the shuttering of up to 150 million tons of induction and EAF steelmaking capacity in China reducing its consumption of ferrous scrap, the Asian giant has actually begun exporting scrap material. Steel Market Update (SMU) has been following the progress of the Chinese as they attempt to enter the ferrous scrap export markets. They […]
The American Iron & Steel Institute (AISI) recently reported final U.S. raw steel production estimates for the month of April 2017. The monthly estimates are different than the weekly estimates we report; the monthly estimates are based on over 75 percent of the domestic mills reporting vs. only 50 percent for the weekly estimates. Total […]
On Friday, the U.S. Department of Commerce released Final Census Data on foreign steel imports for the month of April 2017. As expected, the month was another large one with imports totaling 3,350,983 net tons. This is above both the 3-month and 12-month moving averages. License data for the month of May approached 3.6 million […]
The U.S. coal industry (Trump’s favorite: “I happen to love the coal miners.”) supports the U.S. withdrawal from the Paris climate accord, citing its effect on coal and the economy. “We believe that abiding by the accord, without significant changes, would have substantially impacted the U.S. economy, increased electricity costs and required the power sector […]
On Friday of this past week flat rolled steel buyers were lighting up the Steel Market Update inbox with questions or comments about a potential flat rolled steel price increase to be announced as early as Monday of this week. Steel buyers and executives associated with the service centers were telling SMU that Nucor is […]
Flat rolled steel prices continued their decline this past week. We saw numbers sliding on all products on the indexes followed by Steel Market Update. Steel prices dropped on hot rolled, cold rolled, galvanized and Galvalume as well as plate products. Benchmark hot rolled pricing dropped $15 per ton to an average of $580 per […]
The following article on the hot rolled coil (HRC) futures markets was written by David Feldstein. As the Flack Global Metals director of risk management, Dave is an active participant in the hot rolled coil (HRC) futures market and we believe he will provide insightful commentary and trading ideas to our readers. Besides writing futures […]
As the month of May comes to a close we are seeing import license data from the U.S. Department of Commerce suggesting foreign steel imports of 3.5 million net tons. This would be 200,000 tons higher than April and 100,000 tons above March – both of which we extremely high months for imports based on […]
Flat rolled prices continued their skid despite the Memorial Day Holiday. Prices were lower by $5 to $15 per ton depending on product. Steel buyers continue to be concerned about the direction of prices and how long this downward spiral will last. We have more on the comments received today as we canvassed both end […]
For the week ending May 27, 2017, the American Iron & Steel Institute (AISI) estimated the U.S. steel industry produced 1,753,000 net tons of raw steel, a 0.7 percent increase over the previous week and a 1.2 percent increase over the revised rate from the same week one year ago. The estimated capacity utilization rate […]
Flat rolled steel prices dropped last week as all three of the indexes followed by Steel Market Update (SMU) reported lower pricing. Benchmark hot rolled prices dropped by double digits last week with SMU and Platts at $595 per ton as the week ended and SteelBenchmarker dropping $12 per ton to $611 per ton. The […]
Production in the month of April was 142,080,000 metric tons, down from up from 143,469,000 tons in March. Capacity utilization at 73.6 percent was up from 71.9. The three month moving averages (3MMA) that we prefer to use were 137,479,000 and 72.0 percent respectively. Capacity is 2.35 billion tonnes per year. Figure 1 shows monthly […]
The following article on the hot rolled coil (HRC) steel and financial futures markets was written by Jack Marshall of Crunch Risk LLC. Here is how Jack saw trading over the past week: Steel Flattening of HR futures curve due to decline in nearby futures prices generates heavy trading. It has been an active week […]
The following calculation is used by Steel Market Update to identify the theoretical spread between foreign hot rolled steel import prices (delivered to USA ports) and domestic (USA) hot rolled coil prices (FOB Domestic mills). We want our readers to be aware that this is only a “theoretical” calculation as freight costs, trader margin and […]
Steel Market Update (SMU) has been contacted by end users, distributors and steel mills regarding an article published by another trade publication on Galvalume. The article, which was published on Thursday, May 18, 2017, quoted Keith Medick, president and CEO of Union Corrugating Company, as he made the point that there is not enough light […]
“There’s been further erosion with EAF’s dropping spot to $570-$580, not necessarily tied to volume,” is what one large service center told us this afternoon. “[I am] afraid this market at risk of bigger drops than was anticipated.” Flat rolled price averages were lower across all products followed by Steel Market Update with the exception […]
For the week ending May 20, 2017, the American Iron & Steel Institute (AISI) estimated the U.S. steel industry produced 1,741,000 net tons of raw steel, a 0.8 percent increase over the previous week and a 0.5 percent increase over the revised rate from the same week one year ago. The estimated capacity utilization rate […]
The U.S. Department of Commerce (DOC) reported foreign steel import license data earlier today. May licenses continue at a 3.6 million net ton pace which is quite disturbing (and probably not well timed based on the Section 232 hearing happening on Wednesday). However, almost one-third of the imports are attached directly to the steel mills […]