When asked to comment on spot flat rolled steel prices this week, the president of a medium-sized service center told SMU, “Drifting. Demand seems down.” He went on to report that even with AK Steel and ArcelorMittal reporting extending lead times, the market “feels soft.” Other steel buyers reported that their perception of the market […]
One of the surprises over the past year has been the amount of foreign steel imports still arriving in the United States despite antidumping (AD) and countervailing duties (CVD), a Section 337 complaint, a circumvention complaint and the Trump directive for the U.S. Department of Commerce (DOC) to investigate steel as it relates to national […]
On Friday, Steel Market Update (SMU) adjusted our Price Momentum Indicator to Lower from Neutral. It is our opinion that flat rolled steel prices will move lower over the next 30 days for the following 10 reasons: First, when the head of commercial of a domestic steel mill tells SMU that “transaction pricing cannot go […]
Flat rolled steel lead times have been relatively flat going back to early May 2017, according to the service centers and manufacturing companies who participated in the Steel Market Update (SMU) flat rolled market trends survey this week. Lead time, which is the amount of time it takes for the domestic steel mills to produce […]
Mills are even more open to price discussions than they were a couple weeks ago, report steel buyers and sellers who replied to Steel Market Update’s latest flat rolled market trends questionnaire. More than 100 executives responded to this week’s questionnaire. Steel buyers’ perceptions of their suppliers’ attitudes offer a snapshot of how steel mills […]
Spot iron ore pricing dropped 7.4 percent within the past 24 hours with 62% Fe iron ore fines hitting $63 per dry metric ton (dmt). Iron ore has dropped $15.80/dmt over the past month. On Aug. 22, 62% Fe fines were trading at $78.8/dmt, according to The Steel Index. This morning, we received a note […]
Flat rolled and plate steel prices, which have been fairly resilient over the past couple of months, slipped this week. The biggest move was in plate, which was down $30 per ton, while flat rolled products were lower by $5 to $20 per ton. We will wait to see if this move was nothing more […]
Despite recent price increase announcements from major domestic mills and imports that are trending lower, wholesalers and distributors who sell galvanized steel products to the HVAC market don’t expect much change in lead times or pricing until there’s some resolution to the Section 232 and Vietnam circumvention trade actions pending in Washington. In the monthly […]
Steel Market Update is working on a new index to measure flat rolled steel inventories in service center warehouses at the end of each month. Our goal is to assist the flat rolled steel industry to better understand inventories and their potential impact on steel mill order books and lead times. SMU will also analyze […]
Steel Market Update is working on a new index to measure flat rolled steel inventories in service center warehouses at the end of each month. Our goal is to assist the flat rolled steel industry to better understand inventories and their potential impact on steel mill order books and lead times. SMU will also analyze […]
Steel Market Update canvassed flat rolled and plate steel buyers throughout the day today in order to determine if steel prices have changed since our review last week. We found prices softening on most flat rolled products and heard from steel buyers that the mills were willing to discuss pricing on “real” orders. Here is […]
The Steel Market Update (SMU) Price Momentum Indicator has been “stuck” in Neutral for a number of weeks as steel buyers and steel mills wrestle with the direction of flat rolled steel prices going forward. Steel buyers are beginning to say the next move in flat rolled steel prices may well be lower, rather than […]
Throughout the day (Tuesday, Sept. 12, 2017), Steel Market Update (SMU) has been discussing steel prices, AK Steel’s price announcement and whether or not there is any way the mills will be able to collect another $30 (or anything) based on what is happening in the market right now. “This increase puzzled all of us. […]
Flat rolled lead times, the amount of time it takes for the steel mills to produce an order if placed today, have shortened ever so slightly in the past month, according to data collected by Steel Market Update (SMU) from manufacturers and steel service centers earlier this week. Viewed over a longer time frame, lead […]
Late yesterday (Sept. 6), AK Steel announced a new $30 per ton flat rolled price increase. AK Steel last announced a flat rolled price increase three weeks ago when on Aug. 16 the steel mill raised prices by $30 per ton. So far this year, AK Steel has made seven price increase announcements totaling $215 […]
Flat rolled prices have been mixed since we last produced our indices on Thursday of last week. The expectation is for prices to go higher from here, although Steel Market Update (SMU) is waiting to see how those responding to our flat rolled steel market trends questionnaire feel about the current and future markets. We […]
We did not review pricing earlier this week due to all of our staff being at the SMU Steel Summit Conference in Atlanta. During the conference, we did not want to discuss pricing in an open format. We did check on pricing today and found mixed results depending on the product. Within the data, we […]
Two Federal Reserve manufacturing indexes were released this week with both regions showing strong activity in August. Richmond manufacturing remained relatively steady in August, while Kansas activity rebounded from a weaker July. Fifth District (Federal Reserve Bank of Richmond) The composite manufacturing index in the Fifth District was unchanged in August at a solid reading […]
Last week, the flat rolled and plate steel mills announced price increases. Steel Market Update has seen prices rise in the mill spot markets (not in the service center spot markets) by $10 to $20 per ton. We are hearing from steel buyers (and a couple of mills) that the number of spot orders have […]
How can domestic mills expect to increase prices when their lead times are so short and foreign steel is still so plentiful? In the monthly steel conference call hosted today by the Heating, Air-conditioning, and Refrigeration Distributors International, HARDI members commented on the contradictions in mill behavior that have left them confused and concerned about […]
Flat rolled lead times, the amount of time it takes for the steel mills to produce an order if placed today, have flattened out and are essentially unchanged over the past few months, according to data collected by Steel Market Update from manufacturers and steel service centers earlier this week. On Monday, Steel Market Update […]
Flat rolled steel prices slipped over the past week just as the domestic steel mills began to announce new price increases. Were the increases in reaction to the slippage? Were they in response to new higher scrap costs for August delivery? Most likely, it was a combination of both. We found the spread widening on […]
One of the reasons Steel Market Update has constant contact with steel buyers and steel mills is because we are aware that pricing momentum can change on a rumor or a belief that supply or demand is shifting. We are seeing market sentiment being impacted by Section 232. At the same time, scrap prices are […]
Flat rolled steel prices remained range-bound on most items for yet another week. We picked up a couple of points of weakness in coated products, but they seem to be isolated in nature. Many of the steel buyers are reporting the mills (especially Nucor) are talking up the idea of a price increase on flat […]
Flat rolled steel buyers are fairly optimistic about their chances for success in the current market, though the various metrics Steel Market Update uses to gauge future demand are sending mixed signals. One likely cause is the uncertainty injected into the market by the Trump administration’s now-delayed Section 232 investigation. According to the latest SMU […]
Despite getting pressure to adjust our SMU Price Momentum Indicator due to uncertainty associated with the Section 232 investigation and the lack of a recommendation to date, along with small signs of a need by one or two steel mills for orders on galvanized, SMU is continuing to reference flat rolled steel prices as moving […]
Flat rolled lead times have seen little change in the past month. Twice per month, Steel Market Update conducts an analysis of the flat rolled sheet and plate markets based on responses to a comprehensive questionnaire. When looking at lead times, the analysis is restricted to responses from manufacturers and distributors, who accounted for 84 […]
Over the course of this week, Steel Market Update has been canvassing active participants in the flat rolled steel markets as we try to capture any changes in market trends. The more than 100 respondents we had this week provided us a snapshot on how steel mills are handling price negotiations. As a group, respondents […]
Steel Market Update has seen a bit of a yo-yo effect to flat rolled and plate steel prices over the past few weeks. Since the word got out that the Section 232 decision would not be announced any time soon, the market has taken a step back to evaluate where prices will go from here. […]
Manufacturing activity in the U.S. expanded in July, though the PMI declined 1.5 percentage points to a reading of 56.3, reports the Institute for Supply Management in its latest Manufacturing ISM Report On Business. The PMI has remained above the neutral 50.0 point for 11 consecutive months indicating growth in manufacturing. Although still at robust […]