AK Steel came out with a price announcement – no surprises here. We knew they were positioning themselves to announce. The big question will be with earnings season upon us will the other mills take up the call for increases – or be satisfied with the status quo. The betting money is on the […]
Esmark Inc., Stahlschmidt Inc. and Bouchard Group LLC have announced the joint acquisition of Esmark Technologies. Esmark Technologies will provide technical management services across the steel, manufacturing and industrial sectors and will be based in Cleveland Ohio. Esmark Inc., founded by Chairman and CEO James Bouchard, has strong roots in the steel industry. Current interests […]
Existing home sales slowed slightly in December but limited inventory is fueling price increases, according to the National Association of Realtors. December sales declined 1.0 percent to a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 4.94 million in December from a downwardly revised 4.99 million in November, but are 12.8 percent above the 4.38 million-unit level in […]
A tropical storm shut down ports in Australia on Tuesday stopping shipment of nearly half of the world’s iron ore trade. Port Hedland, Dampier and Cape Lambert shut down operations as vessels moved out to sea and away from the area. The ports service the mines Rio Tinto, BHP Billiton, Fortescue Metals Group and Atlas […]
The American Iron & Steel Institute (AISI) reported their estimated raw steel production data for the week ending January 19, 2013. According to AISI estimates the U.S. steel industry produced 1,824,000 net tons of raw steel last week. This represents an increase of 0.3 percent compared to the week earlier but is 4.9 percent lower […]
ThyssenKrupp AG held its annual meeting Friday and was attended by thousands of shareholders who were angry at the past year’s failures and anxious to hear what solutions management could offer. Supervisory Board Chairman Gerhard Cromme faced intense pressure from some shareholders to resign over the Steel Americas debacle but held his ground. “If you […]
Steel Market Update (SMU) participates in a monthly conference call with HARDI wholesalers who sell galvanized sheet and coil into the HVAC mechanical contractors and related industries for residential and commercial construction applications. The purpose of the call is to discuss steel trends which may impact their regional businesses – this includes domestic mill and […]
An overwhelmingly majority of manufacturers reported service center spot prices as “stable” according to the results of our survey conducted this past week. A full 85 percent of those manufacturing respondents taking our mid-January survey reported no change in spot prices from their service center suppliers. This is an increase of 18 percent compared to […]
Steel Market Update is a member of an association connected to the construction industry called HARDI. HARDI stands for Heating, Air-conditioning & Refrigeration Distributors International. HARDI and The Institute for Trend Research (ITR), an economic forecasting company, work together to gather economic data to provide a forecast to the HARDI members located in the United […]
As was reported over the past week, Steel Market Update found a number of buyers of varying sizes able to purchase hot rolled coil below $600 in the spot market. We did not find every mill or every region participating in the erosion of the bottom end of our range. What we found is the […]
As Steel Market Update (SMU) checked with various market sources after the AK Steel price announcement we found most of the industry expecting the other domestic steel mills to follow the AK Steel pricing lead. At the same time, most buyers expect the net result to be an end to the current slide in pricing […]
On Monday, January 23rd, AK Steel announced a price increase on all flat rolled steel products of $40 per ton ($2.00/cwt). The price increase is for “spot” orders only and is “effective immediately” according to the press release issued by the company. This is the first price announcement so far during the 2013 calendar year. […]
Steel Market Update was founded because I felt the quality of information (as well as the sourcing of information) was not up to the standards I felt necessary when I was selling steel. I can remember contacting one of the periodicals and asking them why they were referencing prices in a certain way when the […]
Written by: Sandy Williams ArcelorMittal Lázaro Cárdenas, Mexico recently launched production of specialized slabs for use in pipelines that transport sour gas. Lázaro Cárdenas is known as a leading producer of high quality, value added steel. In order to increase its share of the growing market for API (American Petroleum Institute) pipes, best technological practices […]
According to Baker Hughes data from January 18th, 2013, the U.S rig count for this week is 1,749 rigs exploring for or developing oil or natural gas. This number represents a decrease of 12 rigs from last week. Compared to last year the 1,749 count is a decrease of 259 rigs. Canadian rigs increased by […]
November apparent steel supply grew by 8 percent year-over-year to 8,468,720 tons. Imports were up by 28 percent (semi-finished being a major piece up 41.57 percent) while exports shrunk by almost 19 percent to just under 1,000,000 tons (998,040 tons). The United States increased its imbalance as a net importer (YOY) has grown apparent steel […]
Written by: Sandy Williams Creditors of bankrupt RG Steel are seeking court permission to sue Renco Group founder and billionaire Ira Rennert for deliberately delaying the bankruptcy filing of RG Steel in order to protect his own financial interests. RG Steel and its affiliates are 75 percent-owned by Renco, with the remaining equity owned by […]
Written by: Sandy Williams Steel Market Update is a member of an association connected to the construction industry called HARDI. HARDI stands for Heating, Air-conditioning & Refrigeration Distributors International. HARDI and The Institute for Trend Research (ITR), an economic forecasting company, work together to gather economic data to provide a forecast to the HARDI members […]
This week, the SMU Fair Value HRC (hot rolled coil) Model has spot HRC pricing below Fair Value for the first time in nine weeks. This is due to the SMU average spot HRC index decreasing $5 per ton to $620 per ton and scrap inputs remaining the same over last week’s figures. The Fair […]
Based on the weighted results from our most recent steel survey which was conducted this past week, SMU found lead times slipping slightly on all flat rolled products followed by our company. Benchmark hot rolled average lead times declined to 3.38 weeks and are much shorter than the 4.76 weeks measured by the SMU survey […]
Benchmark hot rolled coil (HRC) declined across each of the indexes watched by Steel Market Update, as did each of the other flat rolled products. Steel Orbis took their numbers down the most after sitting at $620 on HRC and $720 on CRC for 9 weeks. SteelBenchmarker, which produces their numbers twice per month, and […]
On Tuesday, January 15th, Steel Market Update (SMU) began our second steel survey of the New Year. Our surveys are focused on the flat rolled steel market and are conducted by inviting slightly less than 700 companies who are asked to participate by invitation. Of those participating in last week’s survey 48 percent of the […]
Three mills are out this week attempting to dump steel quickly in the marketplace at $560-$580 per ton. The lead mill is known to do this just prior to announcing a price increase. SMU is being told the mills are asking for large block tons of hot rolled in order to book at these levels. […]
Written by: Sandy Williams Housing starts rose at the fastest pace since 2008, showing continued recovery in the housing market. The Commerce Department said housing starts were at a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 954,000, up 12.1 percent from the revised November estimate and up 36.9 percent from the December rate in 2011. Starts of […]
Written by: Sandy Williams At least eight new steel plants are under construction in Asia (not including India) that will increase the annual output capacity of steel in Asia by 100 million tonnes within the next few years. Currently China accounts for nearly 50 percent of global steel demand with its own annual output capacity […]
Written by: Sandy Williams Metal forming companies are expecting a spike in business conditions in the next three months according to survey data released Wednesday by the Precision Metalforming Association (PMA). Survey data shows 32 percent of participants are expecting conditions to get better in the next three months (up from 22 percent in December) […]
Written by: Brett Linton Utilizing a trailing average hot rolled coil (HRC) price, the SMU Price MoMo Index for flat rolled steel in the U.S. fell below zero percent this week for the first week after eight consecutive weeks of positive momentum readings. MoMo is based upon the current hot rolled coil price weighed against […]
Written by: Sophia Fain A. M. Castle & Co. announced restructuring plans to improve annual operating profit by $33 million once fully implemented in 2013. Changes to its metals business include an organizational restructuring, warehouse realignments and performance improvement programs. “This broad, performance-enhancing plan will enable us to better serve our customers by organizing our […]
Canadian steel service centers shipped a total of 338,600 tons (all products) during the month of December 2012 – this represents a decline of 19.3 percent compared to last year (not adjusted, 16 percent seasonally adjusted) when the Canadian distributors shipped 419,500 tons. At the end of December, Canadian distributors ended the month with 1,832,800 […]