Experienced steel people are beginning to look at what is happening now and comparing it against 2004 and 2008. Both of those years saw prices double (or more) as demand and supply were out of balance. A trading company executive sent SMU the following note: “Is it just me or is this feeling like 2004 […]
There have been many comments made in the press recently regarding the opinions of analysts and consultants as to how long the current flat rolled price environment will last.The Pittsburgh Post published an article by Len Boselovic entitled: “Heard off the Street: Analysts: steel price hike may not last.” This article, which quotes one of […]
Scrap negotiations are taking some time to complete as the steel mills and dealers haggle over what is an appropriate increase above what the mills paid during the month of April. Our sources are advising us that there have been a few transactions in the Midwest and in the Detroit markets. So far the Detroit […]
In an email to their customers earlier today, ArcelorMittal USA became the first mill to announce new base price minimums on flat rolled steel with the opening of their July order book. The new steel price minimums set by AM are as follows: Hot Rolled = $610 per ton ($30.50/cwt)Cold Rolled = $800 per ton […]
In case there is some confusion, flat rolled steel prices are moving higher and, with today’s announcement by ArcelorMittal it is only a matter of time before benchmark hot rolled breaches $600 per ton and cold rolled and coated breach $800 per ton (base plus extras). It has been a very difficult market to gauge […]
We received the following email from a large national service center chain: “I read with great interest your “tsunami” article on the different types of steel buyers, in the Sunday edition. Here’s another perspective I thought of after reading it: I hope that this year’s current market, which includes a high percentage of mill index […]
For the week ending April 30, 2016, the American Iron & Steel Institute (AISI) estimated the U.S. steel industry produced 1,711,000 net tons of raw steel, a 1.6 percent increase over the previous week and a 3.8 percent increase over the same week one year ago. The estimated capacity utilization rate is 73.2 percent, up […]
Double digit flat rolled steel price moves seem to be a weekly occurrence over the past few weeks. Steel mills are controlling their flat rolled steel order books and restricting spot tons. Those buyers who did not recognize things were changing back in the fall when Steel Market Update began pointing out the changes in […]
Cliffs Natural Resources first quarter earnings were stronger than expected by many analysts. The company posted net income of $117 million compared to a net loss of $762 million a year ago. Lourenco Goncalves, Cliffs’ Chairman, President and Chief Executive Officer, said, “Cliffs’ first-quarter results clearly demonstrate how far we have come on our turnaround. […]
Steel buyers are beginning to brace themselves for what may well be another tumultuous month of allocations, closed order books and even higher steel prices. At this point it is a foregone conclusion with most buyers that there will be another increase. The question really is how much higher will prices go during the month […]
The following article on the hot rolled coil (HRC), busheling scrap (BUS), and financial futures markets was written by Dave Feldstein. As Flack Steel’s director of risk management, Dave Feldstein 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 […]
The following calculation is used by Steel Market Update to identify the spread between world hot rolled export prices as determined by SteelBenchmarker and domestic (US) hot rolled prices as published by SMU. Steel Market Update compares the world hot rolled export price to which dollars are added for freight, handling, trader margin, etc. The number […]
The American Institute for International Steel reports monthly on steel import levels. We thought our readers might enjoy looking at the data from the AIIS point of view. Here is the press release for imports in March: Falls Church, VA. April 28, 2016. Steel imports increased 12.8 percent in March and have now expanded by […]
The American Iron & Steel Institute (AISI) recently reported final U.S. raw steel production estimates for the month of March 2016. The monthly estimates are different than the weekly estimates we report in our Tuesday issues; the AISI bases the monthly estimates on over 75 percent of the domestic mills reporting vs. only 50 percent […]
What makes indexing flat rolled steel prices so difficult right now is you have steel mills quoting lead times that may be in May, June or even July for the same product. A hot rolled order placed on SDI last week is actually being produced at the same time as one placed on AK Steel […]
For the week ending April 23, 2016, the American Iron & Steel Institute (AISI) estimated the U.S. steel industry produced 1,684,000 net tons of raw steel, a 0.5 percent decrease over the previous week but a 2.1 percent increase over the same week one year ago. The estimated capacity utilization rate is 72.0 percent, down […]
Steel Market Update received the following email from a large service center in the United States. This executive, who wished to remain anonymous, enjoyed the article we produced in Sunday evening’s edition of our newsletter entitled, “2016 To be a Year of Volatility?” This executive discussed the issue of supply and the possible reversal of […]
This may come as a surprise to some but, there are many who think 2016 may be one of those years where flat rolled steel price volatility, maybe even extreme volatility, could become the norm. We are now in the midst of a five month upswing in flat rolled steel prices which has taken benchmark […]
The steel indexes followed by Steel Market Update showed flat rolled steel spot prices continuing their climb higher as all products moved by double digits. Both Platts and SMU took hot rolled prices up by $15 per ton, although there is a $15 per ton spread between the two indexes. Based on the SMU index, […]
We wrote an article recently (Price Announcements Put Spot Numbers in Clearer Focus, SMU April 17, 2016) which contained an error regarding AK Steel’s “minimum” spot pricing on hot rolled, cold rolled and galvanized spot pricing. The table below references each of the AK Steel price announcements and where their minimum base price numbers should […]
The following article on hot rolled coil (HRC) and busheling scrap (BUS) trading was produced by Andre Marshall and Jack Marshall of Crunch Risk LLC. Well, I wrote last about a month back and at that time I commented that I was surprised how quickly the market (media) had gone from bearish to bullish, really […]
On Wednesday afternoon the Nucor Plate Mill Group announced a new price increase on all new orders as well as all existing spot orders acknowledged for the week of June 4th production and beyond. Plate spot prices will increase by a minimum of $40 per ton. We have seen flat rolled steel price increase announcements […]
It is still a little early to get a solid read on the ferrous scrap market and May pricing, but the indicators are pointing toward higher pricing. We heard from a number of our scrap sources over the past 24 hours and their guidance has been toward the scrap markets moving anywhere from $10 to […]
Source World Steel Association with analysis by SMU. Global steel production in the 12 months of 2015 totaled 1.595 billion tonnes with a capacity of 2.33 billion tonnes. The WSA has made no downward revision to capacity as production fell in the course of 2015 through February this year making capacity utilization look increasingly dismal. […]
Steel prices continued to rise over the past week. A number of buyers are reporting mills as being on allocation (or not open at this time) which is keeping prices very close to the announced levels made over the past two weeks. In some cases, buyers are reporting mills as asking for premiums above the […]
There have been a number of questions about whether steel prices have the staying power to continue to move higher from here. We thought we would bring in another opinion on the subject. MetalMiner published an article on the subject just yesterday and they have allowed us to reproduce the article in tonight’s newsletter. Lisa […]
For the week ending April 16, 2016, the American Iron & Steel Institute (AISI) estimated domestic raw steel production was 1,693,000 net tons, up 2.2 percent from the previous week total of 1,656,000 net tons and up 2.7 percent compared with 1,649,000 net tons in the week ending April 16, 2015. The capability utilization rate […]
The following is one of the monthly analyses Steel Market Update does on key commodities and raw materials which impact steel prices: iron ore, scrap, coking coal as well as zinc and aluminum. Prices of the various commodities have been rising over the past month which is a net positive for the steel industry. The […]
One of the issues confusing the sheet (flat rolled steel) marketplace is the Raw Steel Production report produced by the American Iron & Steel Institute (AISI). This report is produced on a weekly and then again on a monthly basis. The weekly report is released every Monday afternoon and Steel Market Update publishes the data […]
On Friday, US Steel announced a $60 per ton flat rolled steel price increase. This was the first US Steel announcement done in public in some time. The increase came in the form of a letter emailed to their customers. U.S. Steel did not provide minimum base price guidelines in their announcement although minimum price […]