Steel Products

2019 Edition of SMU Steel Summit Conference a Success

August 29, 2019

For the 1,078 individuals who attended our conference on Monday through Wednesday of this week—first, we thank you for your business, your support, your kind words and for carrying the message back to your respective companies.

We had a great conference. There can always be improvements. We constantly strive for perfection, so look for an even better experience next year.

SMU rolled out our Flat Rolled and Plate Steel Service Center Inventories and Shipments analysis, which will be shared with our Premium-level members beginning in September. We also provided details on what data providers will get above and beyond the Premium subscribers. Our next analysis will begin on Tuesday of next week, and our Flash Report will be given to data providers five working days after we initiate collecting data. The final report is due 10 working days after initiation.

Our real-time polling was interesting, as always. As we mentioned in Tuesday’s issue of SMU, the vast majority of those attending our conference will be supporting President Trump for president in the 2020 election.

One of our keynote speakers was Ari Fleischer who explained to our attendees why Donald Trump won and how he can win again in 2020 despite his unfavorable polling. He told our conference that Donald Trump was “mean spirited,” but if he makes the opposition even less appealing, he wins. Fleischer said Elizabeth Warren and Bernie Sanders could not win against Donald Trump. However, he did admit former Vice President Joe Biden could win, as well as possibly someone like the young and articulate Pete Buttigieg, the mayor of South Bend, Ind.

We had many highlights during the conference. Ryan Smith, Global Mill Costing Analyst with CRU, impressed the crowd with his skill and memory. He laid out the numbers for the domestic steel mills against South Korea and other foreign mills and discussed where there are advantages and disadvantages for the USA.

We will have to watch the metallics markets in the coming years with the new EAF capacity coming online. Paul Lowrey of Steel Research Associates was especially sensitive on this topic.

Our attendees, or at least 456 of them who participated in this polling question, felt hot rolled prices will be between $500-$599 per ton at this time next year. We gave them wide latitude since 95 percent of the attendees last year forecast prices to be much higher than where they are today.

When asked what they expected for business conditions in 2020, 51 percent of our attendees said business would be the same as 2019 levels. The balance split with 26 percent saying business would be better and 23 percent saying worse.

SMU got this feedback from one of the conference attendees this morning, “Just wanted to pass along some feedback: I heard from multiple attendees that this year’s summit was the best conference they had ever attended—not just in North America, but globally. I haven’t been to any conferences outside of North America, but I completely agree with that sentiment. Congratulations on the success, and I will not be surprised at all when more people turn up next year!”

Bob Holt of ThyssenKrupp USA told us in a note this afternoon, “Just wanted to say great conference over the last few days. I think it was one of the best. The speakers were all excellent and certainly held my attention during the entire time. I thought it was all well planned and well balanced. I am looking forward to next year.”

SMU received hundreds of similar comments during the conference. It is nice to know our efforts are being well received.

The mainstream press is beginning to get in line with our conference as there were articles in Bloomberg (two articles as of this morning) and The Finance Express, as well as Platts and other trade publications.

For those of you who attended the conference and want to download presentations, here are some helpful comments from Brett Linton on how to obtain the information from the SMU Events App. “In the SMU Events app, go to the ‘More’ menu (lower right icon with three lines) and then tap on the Agenda. Open an agenda segment and the presentations will be linked under ‘Files and Links’ towards the bottom. CRU is working on a survey for us that will go to all the Steel Summit attendees, and at the end of the survey will be download links for all of the presentations.”

Next year’s SMU Steel Summit Conference will be held on Aug. 24-26, 2020, at the Georgia International Convention Center in Atlanta (same as this year). We are committed to the GICC through 2023 and I expect for much longer due to the convenience and quality of the location. Note there will be another new hotel available to us for next year’s event in the Gateway area within walking distance to the GICC.