Steel Products Prices North America

Comparison Price Indices: A More Subdued Pace

Written by John Packard

March 25, 2018

Flat rolled and plate steel prices continued their march higher, albeit at a more subdued pace compared to the past few weeks. Today, we are going to compare the end of the week flat rolled steel indices provided by Steel Market Update and Platts. SteelBenchmarker did not produce steel prices this week as they only report their indices twice per month.

Benchmark flat rolled saw single-digit increases on both Platts (+$1) and SMU (+$5) and both are relatively close to one another with Platts at $853 per ton and Steel Market Update at $845 per ton.

Cold rolled, like hot rolled, saw minor increases, although the spread between SMU and Platts was fairly significant at $21 per ton. SMU saw CRC prices as averaging $970 per ton, while Platts reported $991 as their index number.

Galvanized and Galvalume prices were both up by double digits. Platts reported their HDG number for .060” G90 as being $1,073 per ton, while SMU came in at $1,066 per ton.  Galvalume rose by $20 per ton to $1,276 per ton for .0142” AZ50, Grade 80.

Plate prices were mixed with SMU up $15 per ton, while Platts rose $5 per ton. The two indexes were close on plate with SMU reporting their delivered average as being $925 per ton and Platts $938 per ton (also delivered).

SMU Note: Galvanized prices include $86 in extras for a .060″ G90 product. Galvalume prices include $291 in extras for a .0142” AZ50 Grade 80 product.

FOB points for each index:

SMU: Domestic Mill, East of the Rockies.
SteelBenchmarker: Domestic Mill, East of the Mississippi.
Platts: Northern Indiana Domestic Mill.

Plate price FOB points are different for each of the indexes:

SMU: FOB Delivered to the Customer (includes freight)
Platts: FOB Midwest Mill (includes freight)

Note that SteelBenchmarker produces numbers twice per month. On the weeks they produce numbers we will include them in the average. The weeks where they do not produce numbers (NA = not available) we will not include their outdated numbers in the CPI average.

John Packard

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