Final Thoughts
Final Thoughts
Written by John Packard
July 11, 2016
We discovered earlier today that our office phones (including our 800 number) are down and calls are not being transferred or going to voicemail. We are in touch with Comcast to get the issue resolved. Although we understand it is a system wide failure not just our phones. In the meantime, if you need to reach the office regarding questions, registration or other issues please contact Brett Linton at 706-216-2140. He can also be reached at: Brett@SteelMarketUpdate.com. If you need to speak with me I can be reached at 770-596-6268 or by email at: John@SteelMarketUpdate.com. You can keep these numbers and email addresses in your SMU “happy place” should you ever have issues trying to reach our offices.
We have officially exceeded the number of registrations we had for last year’s Steel Summit Conference and we still have 48 days to go. We do have a list of companies listed on our website (just below the sponsors on the right hand side of the Steel Summit pages). If you want to know who exactly is registered you will need to be registered yourself. Then you can use our SMU Events App (available in your App store at no cost) to search attendees.
As always your business is truly appreciated by all of us here at Steel Market Update.
John Packard, Publisher
John Packard
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Final Thoughts
“We’ll always have Paris,” as the famous line in Casablanca goes. And this month, the global steel industry did as well. The Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) Steel Committee met in the City of Lights earlier this month. There was also a meeting of the Global Forum addressing excess steel capacity.
Final Thoughts
It’s once again A Tale of Two Cities in the steel market. Some are almost euphoric about Trump’s victory. Others, some rather bearish, are more focused on the day-to-day market between now and Inauguration Day on Jan. 20.
Final Thoughts
One of the perhaps unintentional perks of being a trade journalist is the opportunity to travel and cover an array of industry conferences and events. Some I've attended have been at fun locations, like Palm Springs and Tampa, Fla. Others have been in more practical locations, like SMU’s Steel Summit in Atlanta and American Iron and Steel Institute (AISI) and Steel Manufacturers Association (SMA) meetings in Washington, D.C.
Final Thoughts
t this point in the game I think what we can say about Nippon Steel’s proposed buy of Pittsburgh-based U.S. Steel is that it will go through, it won’t go through, or the outcome will be something new and completely unexpected. Then again, I’m probably still missing a few options.
Final Thoughts
President-elect Donald Trump continues to send shockwaves through the political establishment (again). And steel markets and ferrous scrap markets continue to be, well, anything but shocking. As the French writer Jean-Baptiste Alphonse Karr wrote in 1849, "The more things change, the more they stay the same." (I thought the quote might have been Yankees catcher Yogi Berra in 1949. Google taught me something new today.)