Final Thoughts
Final Thoughts
Written by John Packard
August 21, 2019
I have been traveling all day, so I have had limited exposure to the market today. For that matter, as I have mentioned on a couple of recent occasions, I have been almost entirely focused on the 2019 SMU Steel Summit Conference.
So, here are a few comments about the conference for those of you who will be attending…
Dress code: We encourage logo golf shirts as a way of assisting in networking (business casual). Jackets are a personal choice. Ties are discouraged. Women business casual as well (slacks, skirts or dresses are all fine).
Come early: The conference room could very well be standing room only. We have had a tremendous response to our conference this year. We will set a new attendance record.
At 10:30 AM on Monday, the CME Group will hold a Managing Price Risk workshop in the Marriott Hotel located next to the convention center. You can get your badges and conference materials in the south lobby of the Georgia International Convention Center beginning at 10 AM.
The SMU conference program begins at 1 PM ET (sharp) on Monday and 8 AM (sharp) on Tuesday and Wednesday. I will open each day before the first speaker or panel. On Monday, the opening panel is Chris Houlden and Josh Spoores of CRU and me. I will roll out the SMU Service Center Inventories and Shipment Data report, which will be provided to Premium members starting in September.
On Tuesday, the opening speaker is Tom Gibson of the American Iron and Steel Institute. On Wednesday, the opening speaker is Ryan Smith, Global Mill Costing Analyst for CRU, who is followed by Alan Beaulieu of ITR Economics.
Ari Fleischer, former Press Secretary for President Bush, will speak about Politics, Trade and the Economy right after lunch on Wednesday. The program will end around 2:30 PM on Wednesday.
The NexGen Leadership Award will be announced just prior to the steel mill panel late in the afternoon on Tuesday.
We have two networking cocktail parties beginning at 4 PM on Monday (sponsored by Heidtman) and 4 PM on Tuesday (sponsored by Steel Dynamics). Both will last until 5:30 PM, which allows plenty of time to go out to dinner and still have a drink with the crowd at the Marriott Gateway or across the street at the Renaissance.
A note about our Steel 101 workshop in Cincinnati on Oct. 7-8. We had a cancellation, so we have one or two seats left before we are sold out.
One late-breaking item: We have learned that the JSW Baytown EAF has been put on hold. We reached out to John Hritz, CEO of JSW USA, for confirmation and comment, but had not heard back from him as of our deadline for tonight’s issue. Hritz will be one of our speakers at this year’s conference next week.
I look forward to seeing everyone in Atlanta on Monday.
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
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.
Final Thoughts
Votes were still being counted when this column posted on Tuesday evening. And I’d be surprised if we know who the president will be by the time some of you are reading it on Wednesday morning.