December PPIs Show Overall Growth Across Sectors

This report is an analysis of Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) data and is intended to provide subscribers with a view of the competitive positions of sheet steel, aluminum, plastic and wood. The analysis includes some downstream products and a comparison of truck and rail transportation.

On Jan. 15, the BLS released its series of Producer Prices Indexes for more than 10,000 goods and services through December 2020. For an explanation of this program, see the end of this piece. The PPI data is helpful in monitoring price direction as there is a lag between the BLS reports and spot prices for steel products. The actual index values of the PPIs of different products cannot be compared with one another because they are developed by different committees within the BLS, but are useful in comparing the direction of price changes in the short and medium term.

David Schollaert

David Schollaert is deputy editor-in-chief for Steel Market Update. David joined SMU after more than a decade in the metals and mining industry in a myriad of different roles. Much of his early experience and expertise were within the coverage and analysis of steel-making raw materials and served previously as senior editor of the CRU Prices Service. Most recently, however, before his return to market analysis, David held roles as a metals buyer and an operations manager for raw material suppliers. He can be contacted at david@steelmarketupdate.com or 724-720-1008.