Hot-rolled coil notched its first consecutive price gains since March on the heels of $60-per-ton ($3-per-cwt) price hikes announced last week. Don’t get me wrong. The price increases have not stuck in full. They often don’t after an initial round. But they have put a floor under prices. And the market seems to be inflecting […]
Sheet price hikes announced last week by domestic mills appeared to have succeeded in putting a floor under tags this week. The question now is to what extent the increases will stick and whether those gains will be sustainable. Our hot-rolled coil price reflects broader market trends. SMU’s average HRC price stood at $615 per […]
Cleveland-Cliffs is in the process of restarting the No. 7 blast furnace at its Indiana Harbor steel mill in East Chicago, Ind. “All good with the re-start procedure that is ongoing,” a company spokeswoman said in an email to Steel Market Update on Friday, Dec. 2. The Cleveland-based steelmaker said that there had been a […]
ArcelorMittal US has announced new, higher sheet prices with the opening of its 2023 order books. The company said it has also rolled out new grade extras, which will take effect on Jan 1., to reflect higher alloy costs. The price increases effectively apply to AM/NS Calvert, the Alabama mill jointly owned by Luxembourg-based ArcelorMittal […]
If you’re somewhat new to the steel industry, the wave of $60-per-ton sheet price hikes announced by mills in the US and Canada this week might have seemed a little weird. Why did they all announce it at once? Why did they all pick the exact same number to go up by? Let’s say you […]
Nucor Corp. has joined other sheet producers in the US and Canada in a push to raise base prices by at least $60 per ton ($3 per cwt). The Charlotte, N.C.-based steelmaker said the move was effective immediately for new orders in a letter to customers on Wednesday, Nov. 30. “We reserve the right to […]
Is the market at a bottom or not? Cleveland-Cliffs and US Steel have each announced price hikes of $60 per ton ($3 per cwt). And we’re told other mills might follow. If this isn’t a bottom, it sure looks like domestic mills are trying to create one with a floor of ~$600 per ton for […]
The bottom end of SMU’s sheet price ranges firmed up this week following price hikes of $60 per ton ($3 per cwt) announced by Cleveland-Cliffs and US Steel on Monday. It’s not clear yet whether the price increases will stick in full, in part, or simply stop the bleeding. Case in point: Our sheet price […]
Cleveland-Cliffs expects to resume operations this week on the No. 7 blast furnace at its Indiana Harbor steel mill in East Chicago, Ind., after a small fire, a company spokeswoman confirmed. The fire occurred over the weekend and at the beginning of a three-day planned maintenance outage, she told Steel Market Update on Monday, Nov. […]
Wolfe Research managing director Timna Tanners will be the featured speaker on our SMU Community Chat webinar on Wednesday, Nov. 30, at 11 a.m. ET. The live webinar is free. A recording will be available free to SMU members. It’s not too late to register here. We’ll talk about Tanners’ outlook for steel prices, raw materials costs, […]
Wolfe Research managing director Timna Tanners will be the featured speaker on our SMU Community Chat webinar on Wednesday, Nov. 30, at 11 a.m. ET. The live webinar is free. A recording will be available free to SMU members. It’s not too late to register here. We’ll talk about Tanners’ outlook for steel prices, raw materials costs, […]
Rumors of a holiday-season price increase continue to ping pong around the market. Will mills announce one on Wednesday ahead of Thanksgiving, in early/mid-December, or not until early next year? Let’s leave the timing aside for a moment and consider why those rumors have been so persistent. On the spot market side, we’ve seen some […]
SMU’s sheet prices slipped again this week. But some market participants predicted that sheet was at or near a bottom. The anticipation of that bottom appeared to pull some big buyers off the sidelines. Large purchases from some pulled the low end of our hot-rolled coil range below $600 per ton ($30 per cwt) and […]
Hot-rolled coil lead times have been bouncing around four weeks on average since July. HRC prices over that time have fallen from $955 per ton ($47.75 per cwt) to $630 per ton as of last week, a 34% decline. The question now is whether we bottom out around $600 per ton. Will sheet prices and lead […]
The Tampa Steel Conference – which SMU does every February together with the Port of Tampa Bay – offers the tantalizing prospect for those of us in the Midwest of getting out of the cold to network outdoors in Florida. We’ll again hold the conference at the Tampa Marriot Water Street hotel. We’ve got a solid agenda […]
Steel market conditions might be tough for the balance of the year, but Stelco sees the early signs of better times in the first quarter. The Hamilton, Ontario-based integrated sheet producer is also keeping a keen eye out for potential distressed acquisitions, company executives suggested during an earnings conference call with analysts on Wednesday, Nov. […]
Wolfe Research managing director Timna Tanners will be the featured speaker on our SMU Community Chat webinar on Wednesday, Nov. 30, at 11 a.m. ET. The live webinar is free. A recording will be available free to SMU members. You can register here. We’ll talk about Tanners’ outlook for steel prices, raw materials costs, as well […]
Canadian steelmaker Stelco posted sharply lower earnings in the third quarter on falling steel prices and higher raw material tags. The Hamilton, Ontario-based integrated sheet producer expects lower prices and short lead times to characterize the market through the end of 2022. “Despite market headwinds driven by cost inflation and a further deterioration in steel […]
Is this the week that prices bottomed, or do we still have room to fall? If you think ~$600 per ton ($30 cwt) is the bottom, you might point to some positive big-picture developments: strong energy prices, moves by China to prop up its property sector, or the weakening of the US dollar. You might […]
Steel sheet prices fell across the board again this week, with hot-rolled coil prices dropping to their lowest point since late September 2020 – more than two years ago. But industry opinion about the direction of prices has diverged. That’s a significant shift from prior weeks, when sentiment was almost uniformly bearish. Some market participants […]
I wish I could offer you some hope about steel prices getting better. But at the moment, the thing that strikes me most is that $600 per ton ($30 per cwt) for hot-rolled coil (HRC) sure looks like the “new” $600 per ton. That’s a joke of course. I make it in remembrance of all that […]
ArcelorMittal reported sharply lower revenue and profits in the third quarter on falling prices, customer destocking, and weaker demand – notably in Europe. “The strong market conditions enjoyed for much of the past two years deteriorated in the third quarter,” company CEO Aditya Mittal said. “The short-term outlook for the industry remains uncertain and caution […]
The news of the day, outside of politics (I hear we have an election), is that US Steel and the United Steelworkers (USW) finally struck a deal. That’s good news if you were hoping to take an unknown factor out of the market. It’s bad news if you were hoping for higher prices on a […]
Sheet prices fell across the board again this week as the slow grind lower that we’ve seen since last spring continued to gain speed. Hot-rolled coil prices fell $30 per ton ($1.50 per cwt) week-over-week. Declines in coated products were more pronounced, with cold rolled down $55 per ton, galvanized down $35 per ton, and […]
The United Steelworkers (USW) union and US Steel said on Tuesday that they had reached a tentative four-year labor agreement. The USW also said that its bargaining committee had unanimously recommended that union members ratify the deal with the Pittsburgh-based steelmaker. The tentative pact covers approximately 11,000 union-represented workers at US Steel. It does not […]
Canadian sheet and plate producer Algoma Steel Inc. posted sharply lower profits for the second quarter of its 2023 fiscal year. The Sault Ste. Marie, Ontario-based steelmaker said the drop resulted from falling steel prices, operational problems, and higher costs. The company had warned in September that its fiscal Q2 earnings would be substantially below […]
Wolfe Research managing director Timna Tanners will be the featured speaker on our SMU Community Chat webinar on Wednesday, Nov. 30, at 11 a.m. ET. The live webinar is free. A recording will be available free to SMU members. You can register here. We’ll talk about Tanners’ outlook for steel prices, raw materials costs, as well […]
Wolfe Research managing director Timna Tanners will be the featured speaker on our SMU Community Chat webinar on Wednesday, Nov. 30, at 11 a.m. ET. The live webinar is free. A recording will be available free to SMU members. You can register here. We’ll talk about Tanners’ outlook for steel prices, raw materials costs, as well […]
Nucor Corp. hopes to hold plate prices steady with the opening of its December order book. That’s the same approach the Charlotte, N.C.-based steelmaker took last month with the opening of its November book. Nucor said unchanged plate prices were effective Thursday, Nov. 3, in a letter to customers dated the same day. “We reserve […]
Steel prices really took a dive this week. I’ve noted before that some of that could be explained by seasonal factors. And it doesn’t help that inflation and rising interest rates are hurting consumer demand. But it’s also important to keep an eye on what was said during recent earnings calls. Because I think some […]