SMU Data and Models
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SMU Comparison Price Indices: A New Look and Data for 2014
Written by John Packard
December 22, 2013
Steel Market Update continues to expand and one of the areas we are looking to expand into is the world of plate. As we enter the New Year we will begin indexing discreet plate pricing as we do hot rolled, cold rolled, galvanized and Galvalume steels.
We also are changing our CPI (Comparison Price Indices) table. The new look is shown below. Included is the plate pricing, next to each item is the weekly price movement and at the bottom is the average of all the numbers collected and the weekly change for the group.
For the week we found only small movements in pricing with the exception of Steel Orbis which adjusted their galvanized number up $10 to $830 per ton and their Galvalume number up $20 to $1081 per ton (galvanized is based on .060” G90 and Galvalume is .0142” AZ50, Grade 80).
FOB Points for each index:
SMU: Domestic Mill, East of the Rockies.
CRU: Midwest Mill, East of the Rockies.
SteelBenchmarker: Domestic Mill, East of the Mississippi.
SteelOrbis: Midwest Domestic Mill.
Platts: Within 200-300 mile radius of Northern Indiana Domestic Mill.
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John Packard
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SMU’s August at a glance
SMU’s Monthly Review provides a summary of important steel market metrics for the previous month. Our August report includes data updated through August 30th.
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SMU market survey results now available
SMU’s latest steel buyers market survey results are now available on our website to all premium members. After logging in at steelmarketupdate.com, visit the pricing and analysis tab and look under the “survey results” section for “latest survey results.”
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SMU survey: Lead times edge higher for sheet
Current steel mill lead time averages are a few days longer than levels seen one month prior, but remain near historical lows for both sheet and plate products.
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SMU survey: Steel Buyers’ Sentiment Indices surge
Both our Current and Future Indices are now up to multi-month highs, indicating continued optimism among steel buyers.
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SMU survey: Mills’ flexibility on prices up slightly
Steel buyers found mills slightly more willing to negotiate spot prices this week, according to our most recent survey data. Though this negotiation rate has ticked up vs. our previous market check, overall rates have been trending downward since July’s highs.