Big River Steel announced that operations have begun at its melt shop and hot strip mill. The first hot rolled coil was purchased by Zekelman Industries and will be sent to Atlas Tube in nearby Blytheville, Arkansas. The coil was purchased for $100,000 with the entire amount jointly contributed by Big River and Zekelman Industries […]
Nucor announced today that fourth quarter results are likely to be lower than third quarter due to lower margins in the steel mills segment, particularly at the company’s sheet mills, and seasonal slower activity. The raw materials segment is also expected to decline significantly, returning to a loss position due to lower pricing at Nucor’s […]
CHARLOTTE, N.C., Dec. 15, 2016 /PRNewswire/ — Nucor Corporation (NYSE: NUE) announced today that it has agreed to acquire Republic Conduit, a leading manufacturer of steel electrical conduit in North America, from Luxembourg-based Tenaris S.A. for $335 million, or approximately 6x the average of its 2015 and projected 2016 EBITDA. Republic Conduit’s annual shipment volume […]
Members of the USW were headed to court today for the hearing regarding the sale of Stelco, the former US Steel Canada, to Bedrock Industries. The sale has the support of the Ontario government and Stelco but is meeting some resistance from union workers and the City of Hamilton. The USW says the proposal leaves […]
US Steel announced today that it will begin processing slabs on the currently idled hot strip mill at Granite City Works in Granite City, Ill., in mid-February 2017. The slabs for the mill will be sourced from US Steel’s own domestic facilities. US Steel said in a press release that it is making the adjustment […]
Mingo Junction Steelworks has been sold to investor group Acero Junction by the Frontier Group of Companies. Frontier bought the former RG Steel facility in Mingo Junction four years ago out of bankruptcy. “Our goal was always to improve the site and find a viable buyer for the steel making assets at Mingo. Today, we […]
Stelco, the former U.S. Steel Canada, has officially requested to be sold to Bedrock Industries after more than two years in Canadian creditor protection. “Ontario welcomes this latest development in the effort to restructure Stelco as an important step toward saving 2,100 jobs, protecting pensions and supporting economic development in the Hamilton region while ensuring […]
US Steel CEO Mario Longhi told CNBC the company may be able to bring back jobs if regulations and tax laws are improved under the new administration. I’d be more than happy to bring back the employees we’ve been forced to lay off during that depressive period,” he said, which “could be close to 10,000 […]
German steel maker Thyssenkrupp revealed technical trade secrets were stolen in a cyber attack earlier this year. “ThyssenKrupp has become the target of a massive cyber attack,” the company said in a statement on Thursday. Breaches at its plant engineering division were discovered in April and traced back to February. The attacks were attributed to […]
Earlier today Dr. Alan Beaulieu of the Institute for Trends Research spoke to the HARDI annual conference in Colorado Springs, Colorado. He started by telling the 1300 people attending the conference, “We did not change our forecast due to the election.” He went on to say that in government things don’t happen quickly, “The economy […]
The following analysis of the steel markets in China is from Beijing Metal Import & Export Co.,Ltd and is being reproduced by Steel Market Update with permission: Please allow us to update China steel market (Nov 28 – Dec 04, 2016) as usual as following: In the past week, China markets still stood at high […]
Nucor Corp. announced today that it will acquire Southland Tube, a manufacturer of hollow structural section (HSS) tubing for $130 million. Southland Tube is located in Birmingham, Alabama and is the third largest provider of HSS steel tubing in the HSS market with annual shipments of approximately 240,000 tons. HSS is used in structural and […]
US Steel Canada has officially changed its name back to the Steel Company of Canada or, as better known, Stelco, during a ceremony held at Hamilton Works on Friday. The newly designed Stelco flags were raised alongside the flag of Canada as two young girls sang the Canadian national anthem. A similar ceremony was held […]
US Steel Canada has been granted an extension of its CCAA protection while it hammers out a deal with suitor Bedrock Industries. The stay period for USSC was due to terminate on November 30, 2016 and has now been extended to March 31, 2017. According to the 32nd court monitor’s report by Alex Morrison, US […]
One of our main Asian contacts provided SMU with a brief glimpse as to what is happening in China this week: No major changes in Ore prices until after the New Year… Waiting to see if the Chinese Government makes any Regulation changes after New Year. You know this is a normal SAGA around this […]
Flat rolled steel service centers and wholesalers sell material into what is called the “spot” market. The spot market is where a service center customer buys material at whatever price the market will bear in order to fill a short term need. Over the years Steel Market Update has found that when flat rolled steel […]
NLMK USA will re-start production on their #2 galvanizing line at Sharon Coatings in late January. “We should start coating steel late January. The demand for our products is solid, especially for the coated products and restarting line 2 will allow us to better service the light gage requirements of both service center and OEM […]
Earlier this week the Metals Service Center Institute (MSCI) released end of October shipment and inventories data for the U.S. steel service centers. Total steel shipments (all products) were 3,073,400 net tons which was 8.6 percent lower than October 2015 levels. The distributors shipped 146,400 tons per day which was an improvement over the 145,000 […]
October service center daily shipments improved 1.0 percent from September which is better than it seems because since 2009 on average, October has declined by 2.3 percent. Carbon steel shipments increased by 29,700 tons, the number of shipping days was unchanged at 21 and tons/day shipments increased by 1,400 tons. Intake and shipments In October […]
Canadian shipments for all steel products in the month of October were 356,600 net tons, a decrease of 3.8 percent from the month before and a decrease of 6.1 percent from October 2015. Inventories at the end of the month stood at 1,080,600 tons, down 3.2 percent from last month and down 11.2 percent from […]
On Tuesday of this week Steel Market Update (SMU) and one of our Steel 101: Introduction to Steel Making & Market Fundamentals workshops toured the Big River Steel facility in Osceola, Arkansas. We conducted the classroom portion of our program in Memphis and then drove to the mill for our tour and then we moved […]
The following analysis of the steel markets in China is from Beijing Metal Import & Export Co.,Ltd and is being reproduced by Steel Market Update with permission: Today is Monday, Please allow us to update China steel market (Nov 07 – Nov 13, 2016) as usual as following: In past week, market and non-market factors […]
Once per month HARDI* wholesalers conduct a galvanized steel conference call so they can better understand what is happening in the broader markets as they deal with steel pricing, demand and inventory issues. The HARDI monthly call was held on Wednesday, November 9, just one day after the presidential election. Not surprisingly, the future of […]
ArcelorMittal posted net income of $680 million for third quarter 2016. Steel shipments totaled 20.3 million tonnes, down from 22.1 million tonnes in second quarter and 21.1 million tonnes in Q3 2015. Crude steel production in the NAFTA segment decreased 1.8 percent sequentially to 5.6 million tonnes in third quarter. The NAFTA segment includes the […]
(ArcelorMittal press release, 8 November 2016) – ArcelorMittal is expanding its global portfolio of automotive steels by introducing a new generation of advanced high strength steels (AHSS). These innovative steels include the launch of new press hardenable steels (PHS) Ductibor® 1000 and Usibor® 2000 – both of which are already available for OEM qualification testing […]
Inventories, and whether they are too tight right now, have been a topic of discussion lately. Eddie Lehner, CEO of Ryerson Holdings commented on this during the Ryerson earnings call last week. In his prepared remarks Lehner said, “Notwithstanding, the decline of CRU carbon sheet prices from a peak late in the second quarter of […]
Ryerson Holding Co., a processor and distributor of metals in the U.S., Canada, Mexico and China, reported net income of $8.2 million for third quarter. Sales for the quarter totaled $735.1 million, essentially unchanged from second quarter. Shipments fell 5.0 percent sequentially and 2.4 percent year-over-year to 480,000 tons. The lower volume was partially offset […]
Olympic Steel CEO Michael Siegal believes the election is affecting demand and said service center inventories are particularly low as a result. Olympic Steel executives on the earnings call noted that shipments were better in October than in September but fourth quarter is expected to be slow. Said Siegal, “As you know the fourth quarter […]
US Steel has been at the forefront of initiating trade cases and working to strengthen enforcement laws. During the US Steel earnings call, CEO Mario Longhi made the following comments on trade. “We are pleased with the progress we have made so far on the trade front, but much more work needs to be done […]
US Steel reported third quarter net earnings of $51 million compared to a Q2 loss of $46 million and Q3 2015 net loss of $173 million. Net sales in third quarter increased to $2.7 billion, with $114 million in sales coming from the flat-rolled segment and $81 million from US Steel Europe. Sales benefited from […]