Final Thoughts
Final Thoughts
Written by John Packard
May 22, 2019
I am flying back to Florida after completing my second speaking engagement this week. I think I’ve logged 10,000 miles over the past few weeks flying to Atlanta (twice), Chicago, Iowa, Minnesota after having previously flown to Monterrey, Mexico, and Los Angeles. I am looking forward to not going anywhere for a week (I am technically taking Friday and all of next week off…).
At the end of next week, CRU and I will celebrate our one-year anniversary. Recently, I have been asked how I feel now about having sold Steel Market Update to CRU and what the relationship is like one year later? I will tell you I have been very pleased with the support SMU has received from the CRU Group. They have allowed me the independence to continue to run SMU while at the same time providing the resources necessary to improve our conference and to expand some of the proprietary products I had been thinking about.
One product that I am very high on, and I am seeing heightened interest as I speak to manufacturing and steel groups around the country, is the SMU Service Center Inventories index. CRU brought the analysts needed to capture the data needed to provide something new to the industry (only data providers right now), something of value to buyers and sellers of flat rolled and plate steels. We have been adding new service centers to an already well-balanced mix of private and public distributors. We have focused on getting a solid cross-section of the industry that is representative of the full spectrum and I think we have accomplished this, and our monthly numbers are reflective of what is happening in the marketplace. If you are a service center and would like to learn more about our index, what we are collecting, see a copy of the non-disclosure agreement or wish to be added, please contact me at John@SteelMarketUpdate.com
I want to thank Robert Perlman and the entire CRU team for their support of Steel Market Update over the past twelve months, and I am looking forward to spending a long time working with CRU to provide new products, events and services to SMU and CRU clients. Stay tuned.
A note about the 2019 SMU Steel Summit Conference, which will be held on Aug. 26-28 in Atlanta, Georgia. Registrations have passed through the 550 executives mark. We have many new companies coming to this year’s event as the word is out this conference is THE best networking and content conference in North America. Watch our website for updates on the companies that are being added. We try to update the list at least once per week (www.SteelMarketUpdate.com/Events/Steel-Summit). I will have more details about the conference in one of next week’s newsletters (even though I will be on vacation) as I think you will be amazed at the quality of the talent we have speaking at this year’s event.
Hotels – I know the Atlanta Airport Marriott Gateway and Renaissance Hotel room blocks are sold out. Technically they still have some rooms, but they are being sold at their full price, not our discounted rate. We have a room block at the Atlanta Airport Marriott Hotel, which is one exit south of the Gateway hotels and convention center. We will have a shuttle going back and forth from that hotel to the convention center. We will have more information about hotel rooms and where you can get rooms every week as we move closer to the conference start date. Stay tuned (book early!). Here is the phone number for Marriott and our room block: 888-239-1203. You can also find information on our website.
Registration link for the conference can be found here or you can go to our website: www.SteelMarketUpdate.com/Events/Steel-Summit
I spoke with a service center this morning regarding the SMU NexGen Leadership Award, which is being sponsored by the Steel Manufacturers Association. This is the first year for the award as we look to celebrate upcoming, aspiring young people associated with the manufacturing, fabrication, distribution, toll processing of mild carbon and advanced high strength steel markets. You can nominate anyone from your company that you feel would be an excellent example of hard work, dedication, innovation, creativity and someone who may be excelling at problem-solving (or identifying issues and then working to resolve them). This could be a customer service representative, sales or purchasing, someone in IT, accounting, logistics, etc. There are no restrictions on what the person does, only that they are excelling and are setting a new standard for your company, or for the industry. If you want to know more, want to ask questions, or need help submitting someone, please contact me at John@SteelMarketUpdate.com
Monday is Memorial Day so there will not be a Steel Market Update newsletter published on Sunday evening. We will go back to our normal publishing schedule on Tuesday of next week.
As always, your business is truly appreciated by all of us here at Steel Market Update.
John Packard, President & CEO
John Packard
Read more from John PackardLatest in Final Thoughts
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.)
Final Thoughts
President-elect Donald Trump will officially retake the White House on Jan. 20. I’ve been getting questions about how his administration’s policies might reshape the steel industry and domestic manufacturing. I covered the tumult and norm busting of Trump's first term: Section 232, Section 301, USMCA - and that's just on the trade policy side of things. It's safe to say that we'll have no shortage of news in 2025 when it comes to trade and tariffs.
Final Thoughts
Another presidential election cycle has come to an end. If you’re anything like me, part of you is just happy you no longer need to unsubscribe or “text STOP to opt-out” from the onslaught of political text messages this cycle produced.
Final Thoughts
With the US presidential election decided, ‘wait and see’ has quickly turned into ‘we’re about to find out.’ Following Donald Trump’s victory, I had a chance to sit down with Kevin Dempsey, president and CEO of the American Iron and Steel Institute (AISI). He gave his thoughts on what he thought we might see in Trump’s second term in office, and what it means for steel.