For the week ending December 17, 2016, the American Iron & Steel Institute (AISI) estimated the U.S. steel industry produced 1,694,000 net tons of raw steel, a 1.2 percent increase over the previous week and a 14.1 percent increase over the same week one year ago (revised). The estimated capacity utilization rate is 71.4 percent, […]
The following analysis was done by Steel Market Update for our Premium level customers. We are sharing the article with everyone (as well as our Apparent Excess article), well, because we would like all of our readers to upgrade to Premium… The WSA released their November update of global steel production on Tuesday. Production in […]
Flat rolled prices continued their march toward $600 per ton hot rolled ($30.00/cwt) and $820 per ton base prices on cold rolled and coated ($41.00/cwt). Based on the steel indices followed by Steel Market Update (SMU), hot rolled, cold rolled and coated all increased their averages compared to one week earlier. SteelBenchmarker did report prices […]
The following calculation is used by Steel Market Update to identify the theoretical spread between foreign hot rolled export prices and domestic (USA) hot rolled prices. We want our readers to note that we have made a decision to replace SteelBenchmarker as the primary data provider of foreign hot rolled coil prices. We were finding […]
We have an unusual hot rolled futures market article tonight which will be dealt with in two segments: First, we will have an article written by Andre Marshall of Crunch Risk, LLC as he deals with the financial markets (S&P 500), oil and copper and then he has some comments about an errant trade which […]
According to the latest data released from the U.S. Department of Commerce and the American Iron and Steel Institute, apparent steel supply for the month of October 2016 was 8,338,361 net tons. Apparent steel supply is calculated by adding domestic steel shipments and finished US steel imports, then subtracting total US steel exports. October apparent […]
Flat rolled prices rose again this week according to Steel Market Update sources. Our hot rolled, cold rolled, galvanized and Galvalume indices increased by $10 to $20 per ton and are very close to maximizing the increase announcements made two weeks ago. At that time the target was clearly set for $600 per ton hot […]
The flat rolled steel service centers are increasing their spot steel prices to their customers. According to our most recent flat rolled steel market trends survey, 90 percent of the distributors responding reported their company as raising spot prices to their end users or to other steel service centers. The 90 percent number is 5 […]
The following report on the Chinese steel markets comes to SMU from Beijing Metal Import & Export Company,Ltd.: Please allow us to update China steel market (Dec 05 – Dec 11, 2016) as usual as following: In past week, China market still very firm! Iron ore, coke and Billets all touched the highest level in […]
Steel Market Update received the following information about the Chinese steel market through one of our trading sources located in Taiwan. Our source is a very active trader in China trading iron ore, steel and equipment with the Chinese steel mills. Here is some new information about the Chinese steel mills: Things are more complicated […]
For the week ending December 10, 2016, the American Iron & Steel Institute (AISI) estimated the U.S. steel industry produced 1,674,000 net tons of raw steel, a 2.4 percent increase over the previous week and a 12.7 percent increase over the same week one year ago (revised). The estimated capacity utilization rate is 70.6 percent, […]
November import license data is suggesting the month will come in just shy 3.0 million net tons (2.9 million net tons). The U.S. Department of Commerce updated their import monitoring system this afternoon and the early trend for December as for the month to end up around 3.1 million tons. SMU believes the 3.1 million […]
We believe that misinformation (or lack of) about regional import volumes is often used to influence purchase decisions. Our intent with this analysis of tonnage by district of entry is to describe in detail what is going on in a company’s immediate neighborhood and thus provide a negotiating advantage for premium subscribers. We are now publishing […]
Licensed data for November was reported by the Steel Import Monitoring System of the US Commerce Department on December 6th. An explanation of the methodology that we at SMU use to analyze the trade data is given at the end of this piece. All volumes in this analysis are reported in short tons. Total rolled […]
On Friday California Steel Industries (CSI) and later in the day UPI (USS-POSCO Industries) increased base prices on flat rolled products produced by each mill. California Steel was the first mill to move, raising prices on hot rolled by $100 per ton, HRP&O by $100 per ton ($5.00/cwt) and cold rolled and coated by $120 […]
We saw double digit gains in both our indices as well as those of Platts. Benchmark hot rolled rose to $580 per ton average according to the SMU index which is up $30 per ton from one week earlier. By the end of this past week Platts saw their average up $20 per ton to […]
Bankrupt iron ore producer Magnetation LLC has a buyer. Tom Clarke owner of ERP Iron Ore has made an offer for the iron ore operation that closed its last plant in October 2016. Magnetation was a joint venture of Magnetation Inc. and AK Steel. The company recovered waste tailing for conversion into iron ore pellets […]
As you think about your business and where you think benchmark hot rolled prices will be in 2017 and 2018 one of the areas you need to consider are the energy markets. The energy markets have been in the doldrums for the past few years due to low oil and natural gas prices. The net […]
To date the domestic steel mills have announced four flat rolled price increases totaling a minimum of $140 per ton ($7.00/cwt) going back to October 21, 2016. As of today the U.S. steel mills are looking for base price levels on new orders to be placed for the 1st Quarter 2017 to be a minimum […]
The following article on the hot rolled coil (HRC) futures markets was written by David Feldstein. As Flack Steel’s director of risk management, Dave is an active participant in the hot rolled coil (HRC) futures market and we believe he will provide insightful commentary and trading ideas to our readers. Besides writing Futures articles for […]
On Wednesday SSAB, Nucor and ArcelorMittal USA all announced a $40 per ton price increase on plate products. In a letter emailed to their customers Nucor advised of their intention to increase plate prices with: Effective immediately, the Nucor Plate Mill Group will increase transaction prices on all new orders for carbon, alloy and heat-treated […]
Flat rolled steel prices continued their march higher after the 4th price increase announcement set the bar at $600 per ton for hot rolled and $820 per ton on cold rolled and coated steels. The total of the four increases is a “minimum” of $140 per ton going back to the first announcement made on […]
There has been a flurry of activity over the past 24 hours with our sources suggesting that the very early trades on ferrous scrap were done up $30 to $45 per gross ton. As we slide into late Tuesday our sources were advising that the numbers could be up as much as $50 per gross […]
Today, the U.S. Department of Commerce released Final Census Data for October 2016 as well as license data for November and early December. Since there have only been 6 days of licenses collected for December we are going to ignore that data for now and will report on December next week. October foreign steel imports […]
For the week ending December 3, 2016, the American Iron & Steel Institute (AISI) estimated the U.S. steel industry produced 1,635,000 net tons of raw steel, a 2.3 percent increase over the previous week and a 9.5 percent increase over the same week one year ago (revised). The estimated capacity utilization rate is 68.9 percent, […]
A punishment tax proposed by President-elect Trump is not sitting well with either Republicans or Democrats. In a series of tweets instead of a press conference, President-elect Trump rolled out his position on U.S. companies that produce products in foreign countries and sell them back to the United States. “The U.S. is going to substantially […]
Flat rolled steel prices continued to increase this past week with both Steel Market Update and Platts reporting steady to upward movements for all products. The average hot rolled price between SMU and Platts is $560 per ton (up $10 over last week), and the average cold rolled price is $775 per ton (up $18 […]
Late in the day on Wednesday, Nucor and NLMK USA advised their customers of their intention to raise spot flat rolled prices by an additional $40 per ton. This follows ArcelorMittal’s announcement on Tuesday of specific minimum base price levels of $600 per ton hot rolled, $820 per ton cold rolled and coated steel products […]
Ferrous scrap prices are poised to increase to the domestic steel mills and negotiations are under way. The domestic mills did not cancel the open orders that have not yet been delivered which is a sure sign that they expect prices to be higher in December than what they negotiated in November. A pig iron […]
The following article on the hot rolled coil (HRC) and financial futures markets was written by Jack Marshall of Crunch Risk LLC. Here is how Jack saw trading over the past week: Steel Interesting futures markets in steel lately. Today Q1’17 HR traded at $625/ST, 1,200 ST/mo. Also Jan/Feb’17 HR traded at $625/ST, 500 ST/mo. […]