By CRU Principal Economist Alex Tuckett and Chief Economist Jumana Saleheen, from CRU’s Global Economic Outlook Our forecast for global growth in 2021 remains unchanged, with downward revisions to Europe, India and China being offset by upward revisions to other countries, principally the U.S. Although risks remain, we remain confident that the world will see […]
By CRU Chief Economist Jumana Saleheen and Principal Economist Alex Tuckett from CRU’s Global Economic Outlook This month has seen strong signs that the speed of the recovery in the global industrial sector is feeding through to costs throughout the supply chain. Although this does present a risk to our forecast, our baseline case remains […]
By CRU Analyst George Pearson from CRU’s Steel Monitor Chinese prices have rebounded this week after three consecutive weeks of decline. However, trading in markets outside of China was lower last week as buyers waited for further developments in Chinese prices and this fed through to lower w/w gains in Europe and the U.S. U.S. […]
By CRU Chief Economist Jumana Saleheen and CRU Head of Fertilizers Chris Lawson, from CRU’s Steel Monitor Commodity prices have continued an upwards tear in 2021. Steel and its raw materials have seen the sharpest gains, but less well-known commodities such as fertilizers are also attracting attention. With such steep price rises, calls for a […]
By CRU Consulting CEO Rebecca Gordon and Principal Consultant Alex Laugharne The increasing momentum behind transportation electrification is driving new supply chains to evolve rapidly. Historically, long and lean automotive supply chains led to cost efficiencies. The challenges of developing entirely new suppliers and embedding sustainability objectives mean: working with many completely new suppliers who […]
By CRU Research Manager Charlie Durant and Peter Ghilchik, CRU Head of Multi-Commodity Analysis 2021 is shaping up to be a year of economic recovery. CRU is forecasting the fastest annual growth in the world economy for 40 years, underpinned by successful vaccination programs and supportive fiscal and monetary policy. 3+1 Macro Themes In January, we […]
By CRU’s Economics Team The Biden administration has recently announced a $2.2 trillion American Jobs Plan (AJP) spending package, which includes around $1 trillion of spending on infrastructure. In this slidepack, we set out what this could mean for metals demand and the wider U.S. economy. Our analysis suggests that the AJP could boost demand […]
Foreign hot rolled steel prices remain attractive compared to steel sourced domestically, albeit at a lesser potential discount than 1-2 months ago, as foreign import prices are now increasing at a greater rate than domestic prices. U.S. buyers continue to place orders for foreign material despite long lead times for delivery. Foreign prices still hold potential […]
Sometimes it seems like the faster I move the further behind I get…. I think steel buyers are beginning to realize they have precious little control over this market, and they are just along for the ride. As I reviewed the results of this week’s flat rolled and plate steel market trends analysis (our steel […]
When I started Steel Market Update in August 2008 and I began to look at steel prices, I did so from a different viewpoint than the indexes that already existed. Having just completed a 31-year career in selling flat rolled steel, I believed what was most important for steel buyers to understand was the range […]
With trading for May not quite finished this week, ferrous scrap prices appeared surprisingly strong, with obsolete grades up about $20/GT and prime grades moving sideways. Steel Market Update sources put the May price for shred in the range of $450-460 per gross ton, busheling at $590-600 per gross ton, and P/S at $440-445 per […]
Nucor, SDI and Cliffs all announced earnings last week. All of the CEOs are quite bullish as all of their flat rolled mills are running at full capacity. And with pricing now in excess of $1,400 per ton for benchmark hot rolled, the mills are reporting record or near record quarterly profits for first-quarter 2021. […]
Everything You Want to Know About This Year’s Conference There is much to talk about at this year’s SMU Steel Summit Conference as the industry deals with record high prices, strong demand, challenges to supply, questions about trade, new steel mills about to come onstream and more recently announced, automotive moving to electric vehicles, questions […]
Everything You Want to Know About This Year’s Conference There is much to talk about at this year’s SMU Steel Summit Conference as the industry deals with record high prices, strong demand, challenges to supply, questions about trade, new steel mills about to come onstream and more recently announced, automotive moving to electric vehicles, questions […]
Buyers of flat rolled and plate steels continue to complain of their inability to get enough steel in order to supply their customers. In the latest analysis conducted by Steel Market Update last week, 47% of the respondents to our survey reported they were unable to get enough supply. We have seen a small improvement […]
Buyers of flat rolled and plate steels continue to complain of their inability to get enough steel in order to supply their customers. In the latest steel market analysis conducted by Steel Market Update last week, 47% of the respondents to our survey reported they were unable to get enough supply. We have seen a […]
Learn how to build and execute your company’s risk strategy. Would you like to take control of your steel business’s price risk in these uncertain times? With wild swings in steel prices having become the norm rather than the exception, Steel Market Update, in conjunction with CRU and the CME Group, are here to help. […]
Many of our readers are associated with the cold rolled or coated steel markets. Steel Market Update is offering a new workshop for those of you who want to manage price risk on cold rolled, galvanized or other value-added flat rolled products. This is an introductory level workshop, which will be conducted on April 21 […]
The temptation to purchase foreign hot rolled over domestic steel remains high, although at a lesser potential discount compared to previous weeks. U.S. buyers continue to place orders for foreign material despite long lead times for delivery. Since mid-March, foreign steel prices have begun to increase at a greater rate than domestic prices, yet foreign prices […]
Earlier this week, Steel Market Update received an email from a consulting company that is working with a client who is suffering through the high spot steel prices and wanted advice on how to negotiate a contract with their suppliers and basically how to manage the steel price risk. There are many ways to respond to […]
Hot-rolled coil lead times at some mills are well into June, so steel buyers have to ask themselves now whether a year-long upswing in prices is sustainable. In short, can hot-rolled coil prices continue their record run upward? First a Look Back at Where We’ve Been Steel Market Update’s average hot-rolled coil price was $1,340 […]
Over the weekend I was speaking with the CEO of a service center and we were talking about the resistance he was seeing from his plant employees. Many of them did not want to get the COVID vaccine. The office people were mostly vaccinated, but the plant people were not. We discussed the possibility of […]
If you are a buyer (or seller) of cold rolled, galvanized or Galvalume steels, you are aware of the volatility in your pricing, which may or may not mirror the price of hot rolled coil. Over the past few years, the spread between hot rolled base prices and the base prices being asked for cold […]
Foreign steel imports are building, according to the latest license data from the U.S. government. Total licenses were 2.7 million net tons for March. This is well above the 1.984 million net ton average over the last two years. It is also equal to or above the first month of the quarter tonnage, which is […]
Looking for a Top… Looking for Steel…. As we conduct our analysis of the flat rolled and plate steel prices this week, we cannot help but notice the pace of increases has slowed…or is the slowing due to many mill order books being closed and having nothing new to offer. The availability of spot tonnage […]
Looking for a Top… Looking for Steel…. As we conduct our analysis of the flat rolled and plate steel prices this week, we cannot help but notice the pace of increases has slowed…or is the slowing due to many mill order books being closed and having nothing new to offer. The availability of spot tonnage […]
The temptation to purchase foreign hot rolled over domestic steel remains high, as more U.S. buyers place orders for foreign material despite long lead times for delivery. Since mid-March, foreign steel prices have begun to increase at a greater rate compared to domestic prices, yet foreign prices still hold potential discounts of 10-24%, according to […]
By CRU Principal Analyst Erik Hedborg and Analyst Nikki Ni, from CRU’s Steel Sheet Products Monitor The city of Tangshan, two hours east of Beijing, plays an extremely important role in the global steel market. It is the largest steelmaking hub in the world and accounts for 14% of China’s crude steel production, equal to […]
The CRU Group has developed a web-based tool to help users understand emissions at the company and asset level to make better decisions in pursuit of lowering the carbon released into the atmosphere. CRU’s Emissions Analysis Tool uses standardized data and methodologies, calibrated to existing schemes such as the EU emissions trading system (EU ETS), International […]
Would you like to learn how to protect your business and minimize risk associated with unfavorable price changes, by figuring out what exactly is meant by “hedging a position”? Steel Market Update can help to demystify hedging so you can quickly gain a concrete understanding of hedging basics. You will also learn about terminology, market […]