SSAB Americas aims to increase plate prices by $100 per ton ($5/cwt) on all new non-contract orders, effectively immediately. The price hike applies equally to as-rolled mill plate, cut-to-length plate more than 72 inches wide, hot-rolled coils more than 72 inches wide, normalized plate, and quenched-and-tempered plate, SSAB said in a letter to customers Friday, […]
President Joe Biden will be in Pittsburgh next week to unveil his administration’s multi-trillion-dollar infrastructure spending plan. The plan will focus on both physical and technological infrastructure, the president said in a press conference. Spending on infrastructure is about both creating jobs and making the United States a more attractive place to do business, Biden […]
Would you like to learn how to protect your business and minimize risk associated with unfavorable price changes, by figuring out what exactly is meant by “hedging a position”? Steel Market Update can help to demystify hedging so you can quickly gain a concrete understanding of hedging basics. You will also learn about terminology, market […]
Ken Simonson, chief economist at the Associated General Contractors of America, will be the featured speaker at the next SMU Community Chat beginning at 11 a.m. ET on Wednesday, March 31. Simonson will speak to the status of the residential, commercial and industrial construction markets and forecasts for construction in the coming months. He will also cover […]
In the famous words of Isaac Newton, “what goes up must come down.” While he was not referring to steel prices per se, the sentiment still holds true. Steel tags can’t stay at record highs indefinitely. Supply will eventually catch up with demand. What happens then? Will prices see a sharp correction or a gradual […]
Buyers polled by Steel Market Update this week reported little change in the tight market conditions. Mills have few spot tons to offer, and those that are made available get snapped up immediately. Most of the limited spot buys on hot roll are transacting at around $1,300 per ton, but offers reportedly have ranged up […]
Ken Simonson, chief economist at the Associated General Contractors of America, will be the featured speaker at the next SMU Community Chat beginning at 11 a.m. ET on Wednesday, March 31. Simonson will speak to the status of the residential, commercial and industrial construction markets and forecasts for construction in the coming months. He will also cover […]
Steel buyers believe benchmark hot rolled prices will peak at $1,350 to $1,400 per ton ($67.50/cwt-$70.00/cwt) based on our canvassing of the flat rolled and plate steel markets this week. We are seeing spot HRC orders at $1,300 per ton with a few buyers telling us there are offers up to $1,340 per ton from […]
The latest SMU Market Survey results are now available on our website to all Premium members. After logging in at SteelMarketUpdate.com, visit the Analysis tab and look under the “Survey Results” section for “Latest Survey Results.” The historical survey results presentations also are available in the Survey Results section for “Survey Results History.” If you […]
Mill lead times, which means the amount of time it takes to receive (or be promised delivery) for a new order placed today, continue to be highly extended. We share our lead time by product graphic every couple of weeks after we conduct our latest market analysis. We also look at lead times from a […]
Lead times for spot orders of most steel products appear to have leveled off a bit in the past two weeks, based on Steel Market Update’s latest check of the market. All flat rolled and plate products registered small declines except for Galvalume, which was the only one to see an increase in delivery times […]
U.S. electric-arc furnace mills have a leg up on the world when it comes to meeting new carbon emissions standards–for now, said CRU Senior Analyst Ryan Smith. That’s according to a “carbon curve” Smith presented that is part of CRU Group’s Emissions Analysis Tool. The carbon curve is similar to the cost curve many steel […]
Foreign or domestic? “More risk buying domestic….” I had some interesting conversations with steel buyers today as I have been trying to gauge the strength of domestic steel price support, and what will be the catalyst that will turn the tide. One large manufacturing steel buyer with operations around the world told me, “The prices […]
Hot rolled steel prices reached another eyebrow-raising milestone this week, hitting an average of $1,300 per ton ($65/cwt), which is an all-time record even adjusting for inflation from the previous high of $1,070 per ton recorded by Steel Market Update in 2008. Flat rolled prices rose by an additional $10-30 per ton as the market […]
By CRU Analyst Dave Thewlis, from CRU’s Steel Long Products Monitor Prices among all types of long products rose again in April, the most challenged of which remains wire rod. February’s winter storms, which were extreme enough to cause a 2.2% m/m decline in U.S. industrial production, made a difficult situation worse for wire rod […]
In Sunday night’s issue of Steel Market Update, I discussed the increase in the days of inventory on order at the service centers. The increase can be attributed to extended lead times, late deliveries and perhaps some double ordering from the distributors’ end-user customers. We saw an increase in the percentage of inventory that is […]
On Wednesday, March 17, Steel Market Update will host John Packard (SMU CEO) and Ryan Smith, Senior Analyst covering global steel costing and decarbonization for CRU. This will be a special program in that Ryan resides in Sydney, Australia, thus the 3:30 p.m. EDST time instead of our usual 11 a.m. start time Ryan Smith […]
By CRU Senior Analysts Ryan Smith and Ryan McKinley, from CRU’s Steelmaking Raw Materials Monitor Steel Market Update is pleased to share this Premium content with Executive members. For information on upgrading to a Premium-level subscription, email Info@SteelMarketUpdate.com. The need for virgin iron units in the U.S. market is rising as new electric-arc furnace (EAF) […]
By CRU Senior Analyst Ryan McKinley from CRU’s Steel Metallics Monitor The CRU metallics price indicator (CRUmpi) rose by 14.4% m/m in March to 354.4, bouncing back above levels seen in January. China’s return to the steel market following New Year holiday celebrations there helped lift steel and scrap prices in Asia, while seasonally constrained […]
Service centers reported lower shipments during the month of February partially due to the harsh winter weather associated with “Snowmageddon.” Steel Market Update’s proprietary service center inventories and shipments report indicated 42.7 days of flat rolled inventories, which is up from 40 days of supply on hand at the end of January. Plate inventories stood […]
The following article on the hot rolled coil (HRC), scrap and financial futures markets was written by Jack Marshall of Crunch Risk LLC. Here is how Jack saw trading over the past week: Hot Rolled The market saw another strong move up in HR futures prices accompanied by strong volume buying. Daily average HR futures […]
Steel prices simply continue to move higher—as do the anxiety levels of many service center and manufacturing executives. Hot rolled steel set yet another record this week, according to Steel Market Update’s check of the market, reaching an average of $1,270 per ton, topping the previous high mark set in 2008 by $200 per ton. […]
On April 21, Steel Market Update will conduct our first Galvanized Steel Hedging Workshop. This half-day workshop will be done through our virtual platform. The main instructor will be Spencer Johnson of StoneX, who will be accompanied by someone from the CME Group and from CRU, which generates the index used by the CME for […]
Plate from South Korean steelmaker Hyundai is being offered for $980-1,020 per ton ($49-51/cwt) for third-quarter delivery to U.S. ports, according to market participants. The lower end of that range is representative of the delivered duty paid (DDP) price to Gulf Coast ports. The higher end of the range is for delivery to West Coast […]
The U.S Department of Commerce has decided to continue antidumping duties on cut-to-length plate imported from China, Russia and Ukraine as part of the “sunset review” process. China will remain subject to dumping margins of up to 128.59%, Russia to dumping margins of as much as 185% and Ukraine to margins of up to 237.91%, […]
Last week, we conducted one of our flat rolled and plate steel market trends analyses. Or, to put it another way (that the search engines don’t like), we conducted one of our surveys that we do ever other week. We invited over 500+ market participants, most of whom are steel buyers in the manufacturing and […]
As expected, ferrous scrap prices for March settled up $50 per ton for obsolete grades and up $70 per ton for prime grades in most parts of the U.S., reported Steel Market Update sources. April scrap is likely to remain relatively unchanged. “Looking forward, I don’t see downside for prime grades in April. Depending on […]
Obsolete scrap prices are widely expected to decline in April, while prime scrap prices move sideways, predict Steel Market Update sources. Ferrous scrap prices saw a big jump in March, adding to the upward momentum on finished steel prices, but the April effect is shaping up to be more moderate. “Growing obsolete scrap availability caused […]
Ferrous scrap prices have traded flat to down in April following a big jump in March. Steel Market Update sources report the price for obsolete grades down $20/GT, while prime grades traded sideways. The price for shredded scrap is about $430/GT delivered to the mills in the Midwest and South. Prime grades are around $130-140 […]
Availability from domestic sheet mills is getting worse again after briefly improving last month, according to some market participants. The trend follows winter storms taking out production at electric-arc furnace (EAF) producers in the southern U.S. in February and ahead of a raft of upcoming maintenance outages in the second and third quarter, sources said. […]