The following article was written by George F. Will as an opinion piece in the Washington Post. It was originally published on Jan. 26, 2018. Like Horatius at the bridge, or the boy who stood on the burning deck whence all but he had fled, or the Dutch boy who saved the city by putting […]
The Nucor Sheet Mill Group informed customers today, Friday, that it is raising base prices on new orders by a minimum of $30 per ton on hot rolled, cold rolled and galvanized products. Nucor’s latest hike follows a $40 per ton increase the steelmaker announced on flat rolled spot prices early this month. On Thursday, […]
West Coast steel mills California Steel Industries (CSI) and USS-POSCO Industries (UPI) announced further flat roll price increases yesterday, Jan. 24. Today, ArcelorMittal USA began advising their flat rolled customers of a change in their minimum base price levels on hot rolled, cold rolled and coated steels. CSI told customers that due to changing market […]
January imports are trending higher than expected at 2.8 million net tons, similar to what was imported one year ago. This is a bit disappointing to many in the steel industry who were expecting total steel imports to drop as they did in November and December 2017. To get a more complete view, we look […]
Cleveland Cliffs reported another great quarter with net income of $318 million and sales of $601 million, compared to prior-year income of $81 million and sales of $754 million. For the full year, revenue totaled $2.3 billion with net income of $371 million. Adjusted EBITDA has increased for the past two years, 28 percent in […]
U.S. raw steel production for the week ending Jan. 20 totaled 1,693,000 net tons, a 2.5 percent decrease from the same period last year, and down 0.8 percent from the prior week. The mill capability utilization rate for the week averaged 72.6 percent, down from 73.2 percent the prior week, reports the American Iron and […]
The pile of unfinished paperwork on President Trump’s desk just got a little taller with Friday’s delivery of the Section 232 report on aluminum. It joins the Section 232 report on steel that hit the president’s desk on Jan. 11, starting the clock on a 90-day deadline for possible trade action. On Jan. 19, the […]
Flat rolled and plate steel prices moved higher last week, based on the steel indexes followed by Steel Market Update. Benchmark hot rolled is quickly approaching $700 per ton (average) with SMU having the highest pricing while Platts, which was at $695.75 on Friday morning, dropped to $694 ($693.50) when we checked again over the […]
The spot price of West Texas Intermediate (WTI) broke through the $60 level on Dec. 29 for the first time since Dec. 18, 2014. It reached $64.22 on Jan. 12 before falling back to $63.82 on Jan. 16. The total number of operating rigs exploring for oil and gas increased by 15 in the week […]
Steel buyers recognize that flat rolled prices are moving higher and momentum is clearly on the side of the steel mills. Hot rolled price offers, which Steel Market Update identified earlier this week as being $650 to $710, have moved higher based on information gleaned from steel buyers today. The new spread is $680 to […]
U.S. raw steel production for the week ending Jan. 13 totaled 1,707,000 net tons, a 1.7 percent decrease from the same period last year, but up 3.5 percent from the prior week. The mill capability utilization rate for the week averaged 73.2 percent, up from 70.7 percent the prior week but down from 74.5 percent […]
The U.S. Department of Commerce released import license data earlier today, which indicates that January steel imports are trending slightly higher than December’s 2,475,249 tons. Right now, based on the first 16 days of data, January is trending toward a 2.5 million to 2.7 million net ton month. Semi-finished imports (slabs/billets), which are purchased by […]
The Keystone XL pipeline faces another potential delay in its effort to finish construction through the U.S. Midwest. Nebraska landowners filed an appeal to the Nebraska Court of Appeals to contest the approval of the pipeline’s route through their state. Landowners say the Nebraska Public Service Commission had no right to approve an alternative pipeline […]
Steel plate prices are rising as demand tightens and lead times lengthen. On Thursday of this past week, Steel Market Update published an article containing comments from steel buyers in both flat rolled and plate steel products. One comment sparked a discussion between one of the domestic steel mills and SMU (and indirectly with the […]
Flat rolled steel prices moved higher this past week, according to the steel price indexes followed by Steel Market Update. It’s a combination of moving into the New Year and getting the holidays behind us, stronger demand on many products and the steel mills moving to collect some, if not all, of the recent flat […]
Apparent steel supply for the month of November totaled 8,723,547 net tons, according to the latest data from the U.S. Department of Commerce and the American Iron and Steel Institute. Apparent steel supply is calculated by adding domestic steel shipments and finished U.S. steel imports, then subtracting total U.S. steel exports. November apparent steel supply […]
The iron ore mining operations at Magnetation could restart this summer, according to new owner Tom Clarke. The Grand Rapids, Minn., Plant No. 4 has been idle for more than a year and requires about $2 million to get equipment up to speed. ERP Iron Ore purchased Magnetation out of bankruptcy a year ago, but […]
Imports of rolled steel into the United States have been on the decline since peaking in July, based on a three-month moving average of government import data through the end of 2017. In three months through December compared to three months through September, total rolled steel imports declined by 16.8 percent, while sheet products dropped […]
In Q1 2018, long product imports increased by 9.5 percent compared to Q4 2017. Total long product imports were down by 150,000 tons per month year over year on a three-month moving average (3MMA) basis, but there was a turn for the worse in the first quarter, according to Steel Market Update’s analysis of federal […]
In Q1 2018, tubular product imports increased by 3.8 percent compared to Q4 2017. Total rolled steel imports increased by 3.6 percent, and tubular products by 3.8 percent, in the three months through March compared to three months through December 2017, but on a year-over-year basis tubulars were up by 20.2 percent, according to Steel […]
This analysis breaks down the imported tonnage of six flat rolled products into the district of entry and the source country. We believe that misinformation (or lack of) about regional import volumes is often used to influence purchase decisions. Our intent with this analysis is to describe in detail what is going on in a […]
As we collected hot rolled, cold rolled, galvanized, Galvalume and plate prices earlier this week, we asked a number of questions trying to get reactions from the steel buyers. We asked how high steel prices could go (using hot rolled as the benchmark) and what were the key drivers affecting prices right now. Here are […]
Last week, Steel Market Update conducted our first flat rolled steel market trends analysis of the New Year. We invited comment from 640 individuals associated with the flat rolled steel industry in manufacturing, steel distribution, steel mills, trading companies and others who service the industry. One of the key areas we research during the survey […]
U.S. steel exports declined 1.5 percent from October to November, but were higher than the same month in 2016, according to data from the American Institute for International Steel. Exports of 882,665 net tons jumped 21 percent year-over-year. Nearly half of those November exports – 431,980 net tons, essentially unchanged from October but 17.7 percent […]
Cyclone Joyce is intensifying off Australia’s western coast, prompting the Pilbara Ports Authority to take emergency precautions. The storm is expected to reach Category 3 by Friday or Saturday with possible wind gusts of 102-139 miles per hour. Port Hedland, used as an iron ore export terminal by major ore producers Fortescue, BHP and Hancock […]
A handful of carbon steel plate mills have followed Nucor’s lead and announced price increases of $50 per ton today, effective immediately on all new or unconfirmed orders. All extras will remain unchanged. Evraz North America increased transactional prices on all carbon, HSLA, Hot Rolled Coil, Normalized, and all Quenched & Tempered products including Armor […]
U.S. raw steel production for the week ending Jan. 6 totaled 1,649,000 net tons, a 5.0 percent decrease from the same period last year, but up 0.7 percent from the prior week. The mill capability utilization rate for the week averaged 70.7 percent, up from 70.2 percent the prior week but down from 74.5 percent […]
On Wednesday, Jan. 3, 2018, Nucor announced a $40 per ton price increase on all spot flat rolled products produced at their steel mills. Their announcement was quickly followed by similar announcements on hot rolled, cold rolled and coated steels (galvanized and Galvalume) by U.S. Steel, NLMK USA and AK Steel. On Friday of this […]
The Nucor Plate Group has increased transaction prices on all new orders for carbon, alloy and heat-treated plate by $50 per ton, effective immediately on any new or unconfirmed orders. Nucor’s Jan. 5 price hike follows on a $50 per ton increase announced Dec. 6 and a $40 per ton increase announced Nov. 15 on […]
During the middle of this past week, a number of the domestic mills, led by Nucor in the east and California Steel in the west, raised flat rolled steel prices. With steel buyers just returning from the extended Christmas and New Years holidays, we found price offers were up, but the actual placement of orders […]