This morning, Steel Market Update (SMU) adjusted our Price Momentum Indicator from Lower to Neutral. This move is being made as we are seeing more evidence of the domestic steel mills taking a stand and either raising spot prices (especially on coated steels) or are refusing to go any lower. As one steel buyer put […]
The U.S. Department of Commerce released license data collected through December 1st for the month of November. Based on license data (which can vary from the final census numbers) November foreign steel imports should be approximately 2.5 million net tons. If correct, this would be the lowest level seen since December 2013 which was the […]
The following lead times are averages generated out of the flat rolled steel market analysis we conducted beginning on Monday of this week. Actual mill lead times will vary from mill to mill and we always recommend that buyers speak to their mill representatives in order to obtain the most up to date lead times […]
The frustration is beginning to build in the voices of some of the steel buyers as they deal with continuing depreciating flat rolled steel inventories. Prices have been falling since the middle of May 2015 when prices hit a cycle peak of $685 per ton ($34.25/cwt). With our latest adjustment to our hot rolled coil […]
As part of your Premium level service, Steel Market Update (SMU) analyzes the service center shipment and inventory data and provides a short term forecast for carbon flat rolled steel shipments, inventories and how they will impact pricing over the next four months. This is done through a proprietary model and the results provided are […]
All eyes are looking ahead to after the Thanksgiving Holidays. As lead times approach the New Year (for hot rolled coil, most coated products are already well into 1st Quarter 2016) and customers think of restocking/preparing for 2016 business levels, this tends to be prime time for the domestic mills to announce price increases. To […]
Flat rolled steel and plate prices continued to slide this past week according to the various steel indexes followed by Steel Market Update. SMU saw prices as being sideways on hot rolled, down $10 on cold rolled, down $5 on galvanized and down $10 on Galvalume. Both CRU ($376) and Platts ($375) dropped their averages […]
Twice per month, Steel Market Update (SMU) conducts an analysis of the flat rolled steel market from the perspective of active buyers and sellers of sheet and coil products. We invite approximately 560 companies to participate through the use of a questionnaire that we have been using since 2008. One of the areas probed is […]
Based on the results of this week’s flat rolled steel market analysis (survey) conducted by Steel Market Update (SMU) the flat rolled steel mills continue to aggressively pursue orders by negotiating spot prices on hot rolled, cold rolled, galvanized and to a slightly lesser extent, Galvalume. As you can see by the graphic shown below, […]
Flat rolled steel prices moved sideways to slightly lower this week, an improvement from the almost straight-line dive we have been reporting for the last couple of months. Our benchmark hot rolled index remained the same as the week prior at $380 per ton ($19.00/cwt) but we did pick up some minor movement at the […]
Late Tuesday afternoon the U.S. Department of Commerce released import license data through the 17th of the month. Based on the licenses received during the first 17 days of the month, November is trending toward a similar month, September, at approximately 2.8 million net tons. Remember, this is only a trend based on the license […]
For those of you who have been steady readers and members of Steel Market Update you know that the purpose of my Final Thoughts is for me to voice some of my thoughts and opinions on a wide range of topics. I am going to use this forum today to speak about what I am […]
Flat rolled and plate prices continued to erode this past week according to the various steel indexes followed by Steel Market Update. With the exception of SteelBenchmarker (who tends to be behind the other indexes due to it only collecting market price intelligence twice per month), all of the indexes are showing hot rolled prices […]
Trade protection is a driving concern for the U.S. steel industry that has seen prices and domestic demand plummet as low priced steel imports flooded American shores. Steel mills, unions and legislators have lobbied for stronger enforcement of trade policies and the additional safeguards from dumped and subsidized imports and currency manipulation. Currently the focus […]
This article was originally published in Steel Market Update newsletter dated November 15, 2015. We provide our members up to date analysis of the status of antidumping and countervailing duty trade cases affecting the flat rolled and plate steel markets. Trade protection is a driving concern for the U.S. steel industry that has seen prices […]
The following article is another example of Premium level content that is not normally seen by our Executive level members. If you would like to learn more about upgrading your membership from Executive to Premium please contact our office: info@SteelMarketUpdate.com or by phone: 800-432-3475. This report compares domestic mill shipments and total supply to the […]
Steel Market Update (SMU) is constantly being asked to provide details as to the status of the hot rolled, cold rolled and corrosion resistant (CORE) antidumping and countervailing duty trade suits. This article is a follow up to an earlier article originally published on August 18, 2015. The real action is beginning with the US […]
The following article is one that is produced for our Premium level members once we release the latest Imports by Product, Port & Country data into our website. In this article we want to give you a little feel for the data. Once you start reviewing imports by port you can begin to ask questions […]
Flat rolled steel prices continued their months long swoon as steel buyers confided in Steel Market Update that lower prices/offers are available for those who actually have tonnage to sell. One service center executive told us today, “We are getting offers for HR at around the $360NT price. I see a lot of material still […]
The U.S. Department of Commerce released import license data this afternoon. Steel Market Update reviews the data and compares it against previous months’ data at the same point in time during the month. What we are concentrating on are the four flat rolled items involved in the ongoing trade cases (AD/CVD). We are seeing a […]
The various flat rolled steel indexes followed by Steel Market Update are falling in line and reporting hot rolled, cold rolled, galvanized and plate prices the same. We find this interesting as the various steel price collection techniques are slightly different from one another. Could this be a harbinger that flat rolled prices are close […]
License data for October was updated on November 3rd through the Steel Import Monitoring System of the US Commerce Department. At SMU we perform a detailed analysis of this data, an explanation of our methodology is given at the end of this write up. Total rolled product licensed imports in the single month of October were […]
Twice per month, Steel Market Update (SMU) conducts an analysis of the flat rolled steel market from the perspective of active buyers and sellers of sheet and coil products. We invite approximately 560 companies to participate through the use of a questionnaire that we have been using since 2008. One of the areas probed is […]
Our flat rolled steel survey respondents reported the domestic steel mills as willing to negotiate flat rolled steel prices on virtually every product. The results of our flat rolled steel market analysis conducted throughout this week saw 93 percent of our respondents reporting benchmark hot rolled pricing as being negotiable. This is just about the […]
Based on the most recent import license data released by the U.S. Department of Commerce, October import licenses totaled 3,399,248 net tons. We anticipate when the final census numbers are released for the month of October total steel imports will be somewhere between 3.2 and 3.4 million tons (net tons not metric tons). Imports of […]
We found flat rolled prices so far this week at about the same levels seen one week ago. Our hot rolled average remained at $390 per ton ($19.50/cwt) with both the upper and lower parts of our range at the same levels seen one week ago. The lower end of the cold rolled price range […]
On Friday, October 30, 2015, the U.S. Department of Commerce announced their Preliminary Determination that critical circumstances existed on corrosion resistant steels from certain mills in the Peoples Republic of China (China), South Korea (Korea), Italy and Taiwan. Critical circumstances were not found for any company from India and only ILVA was identified from Italy. […]
Flat rolled steel prices continued to erode at a moderate pace this past week. Steel Market Update reviewed the results of three other steel indexes as well as our own for the week ending October 30, 2015. We found, with the exception of the Platts indices, all of the other indexes saw prices down by […]
October was the second month in a row where SMU had our Pricing Momentum Indicator pointing toward lower pricing. SMU reports hot rolled coil, cold rolled, galvanized and Galvalume pricing every Tuesday evening. During October we produced our steel prices indices four times. HRC was reported at $420 per ton the first Tuesday of the […]
I am aware that on October 23, 2015 the domestic steel mills filed allegations of critical circumstances on exports of hot rolled coil from four countries: Brazil, Australia, Japan and The Netherlands. I will have more details and statements from both buyers and sellers later this week. I wanted to spend time studying the affirmative […]