The recent strength in the physical market has sent futures prices up over the past month. This week, however, prices have begun to soften as most market participants feel the market has reached a top. Talk of revived imports coming in as well as some domestic mills offering deals a bit below published prices has […]
The combination of higher spot prices and adjustments to contract negotiations has caused some buyers of flat rolled steel to seek alternatives to their normal domestic source of supply. Steel Market Update is beginning to get confirmations from both manufacturing companies and service centers of larger foreign tonnage purchases being made for 1st and early […]
The domestic steel mills continued to put pressure on spot market pricing which resulted in another small increase in our flat rolled price assessments for this week. We continue to hear from buyers that prices are only somewhat negotiable ($10-$30 per ton off of the price announcement levels). This is somewhat of a change from […]
During our HARDI steel conference call held earlier today (see article above) one of the wholesalers asked the question how many times have we seen galvanized base prices at, or above, $40.00/cwt? We thought it was a legitimate question and was one we could easily answer using our own galvanized base price indices. So, SMU […]
For the week ending October 19, 2013, the American Iron & Steel Institute (AISI) reported that the U.S. steel industry produced 1,835,000 net tons of raw steel, a 0.6 percent decrease over the previous week but a 8.5 increase over the same week one year ago. The estimated capacity utilization rate is 76.6 percent, down […]
The domestic mills pushing for customers to switch to Platts indices may shudder when they realize that Platts benchmark hot rolled coil index is the lowest of the five followed by Steel Market Update.Even so, all of the indices are now within $6 per ton of each other. The average price for hot rolled, using […]
According to Baker Hughes data from October 18th, 2013, the U.S rig count for this week is 1,739 rigs exploring for or developing oil or natural gas. This count is a decrease of 4 rigs when compared to last week, with oil rigs down 6 to 1,361 rigs, gas rigs up 3 to 372 rigs, […]
Financial Markets: Okay now that that mess is over with, the S+P 500 and other U.S markets can get back to the business of what they do best – Go Up! In fact we, have already reached all time highs (again) today with the S+P 500 at 1733. As I noted, we are likely headed […]
One of the questions posed to the approximately 600 companies invited to participate in our mid-October flat rolled steel survey was if they believed if any or all of the announced flat rolled price increases would be collected by November 1st. A large majority of almost two-thirds – 64.8 percent – responded that at least […]
The following information was in a press release received by SMU from CRU. We have requested more information from CRU regarding the audit, how it has impacted their data providers and any other pertinent information they were able to gather through the process. We will follow up with another article when we receive information from […]
Steel Market Update (SMU) is seeing prices beginning to rise on all flat rolled products. With a couple minor exceptions mostly contained to the South, we have been seeing a united front and mills are telling SMU that they have been able to collect most, if not all, of the price increases announced. We continue […]
Steel Market Update (SMU) has been doing some quick channel checks to see what offers are available out there for foreign steel. Our steel market survey, which we began on Monday morning of this week, has been suggesting a higher level of interest in foreign steel due to the higher domestic prices and the spread […]
For the week ending October 12, 2013, the American Iron & Steel Institute (AISI) reported that the U.S. steel industry produced 1,847,000 net tons of raw steel, a 1.4 percent decrease over the previous week but a 9.2 increase over the same week one year ago. The estimated capacity utilization rate is 77.1 percent, down […]
According to Baker Hughes data from October 11th, 2013, the U.S rig count for this week is 1,743 rigs exploring for or developing oil or natural gas. This count is a decrease of 13 rigs when compared to last week, with oil rigs down 5 to 1,367 rigs, gas rigs down 9 to 369 rigs, […]
There was little to no change with most of the indices this past week. What might have been the most noteworthy is Steel Orbis is no longer the lowest priced on benchmark hot rolled. Also of note is Platts is no longer the highest priced index for HRC. Will this be the week when prices […]
Shipping in the Capesize Market is beginning to slow down after a strong September driven by iron ore restocking in China and exports of ore from Brazil. According to the MID-SHIP Report on Oct. 10, average Capesize earnings fell to $33,368 from $42,211 two weeks ago. Time charters averaged $30,000 prompting owners to turnover cargo […]
There is a lot going on regarding contracts, contract negotiations and the timing of when orders/commitments need to be placed with the domestic steel mills. SMU has had direct conversations and seen email correspondence which suggests at least one of the integrated steel mills is pushing for remaining 2013 tonnage to be placed right away […]
Steel Market Update (SMU) asked David Phelps, president of the American Institute for International Steel if there were any issues involving steel imports which our readers needed to be aware. He sent us an email with the following: “…the Customs officials employed at the ports to process imports and exports are considered essential. The licensing […]
SMU has received a number of questions about the overall level of imports into the U.S. For example, 33.5 million tons in 2012 sounds like a lot. We don’t see this magnitude on the flat rolled side. Could someone please explain what product forms the imports are coming in and where they are coming from? […]
Financial Markets: Two weeks back we suspected that the SP 500 and other US equities markets would struggle with all this Government Shutdown shenanegans. Sure enough, the SP 500 dropped progressively down to a low of 1646 yesterday from the 1697 level we had two weeks ago. However, since the announcement today of the preverbial […]
For the week ending October 5, 2013, the American Iron & Steel Institute (AISI) reported that the U.S. steel industry produced 1,873,000 net tons of raw steel, a 1.1 percent increase over the previous week and a 9.6 increase over the same week one year ago. The estimated capacity utilization rate is 78.2 percent, up […]
Buyers are telling Steel Market Update (SMU) that there have been some spot price offers which were held through the end of this past week. Most, however, are informing us that those mills who publicly announced new pricing are asking for increases and holding the line. We don’t doubt that there could be some orders placed […]
The proposed Keystone XL pipeline from Canada’s oil sand region to the Gulf Coast has been delayed until 2014. In a securities filing, TransCanada said it “no longer expects that the decision on the presidential permit required for the project will be made by year end and the corporation anticipates that its previously disclosed expected […]
In a normal ferrous scrap market the first deals done at the beginning of the month are usually those with the best pricing. The month of October is turning out to be one of the exception months as many dealers rejected the preliminary lower offers and managed to trade steel scrap at the same numbers […]
The various steel indices followed by Steel Market Update showed very little change in their pricing assessments of flat rolled steel coils. Most of the indexes saw prices as moving sideways as we wait for buyers to digest the latest offerings from the domestic steel mills. In the case of Steel Market Update we collected […]
Steel Market Update (SMU) began our most recent survey on Monday morning of this past week. Shortly after our survey began the domestic mills announced price increases. As the week progressed more announcements were made. None-the-less, our survey respondents did not seem to believe flat rolled steel prices will rise over the next few weeks. […]
During the past few surveys, Steel Market Update has been asking if the additional tonnage being brought on-stream by U.S. Steel (Lake Erie), ThyssenKrupp Steel USA (building back slab inventory) and AK Steel would cause an imbalance in supply-demand ratios. Almost everyone within the industry has been of the opinion that the extra supply would […]
According to Baker Hughes data from October 4th, 2013, the U.S rig count for this week is 1,756 rigs exploring for or developing oil or natural gas. This count is an increase of 12 rigs when compared to last week, with oil rigs up 10 to 1,372 rigs, gas rigs up 2 to 378 rigs, […]
After weeks and months of a sideways market, the recent mill price hike announcements have been the spark the futures market needed to ignite trading activity. Over 8,000 tons have traded the past few days as the potential for the physical market to move higher has squeezed shorts causing them to cover and for speculators […]
TSI Iron Ore: Market Quiet During Chinese Golden Week… Iron ore prices have remained steady over the past week as the Chinese have been off for their Golden Week holiday. Demand while steady appears to be seen as fragile by many. The market remains in backwardation with prices down the curve continuing to trade at a […]