Recently, Steel Market Update produced an article regarding a discussion between Dan DiMicco, former CEO of Nucor and another one of our LinkedIn members who, in a past life, was responsible for buying foreign slabs for a domestic steel mill. Here is a small clip of that conversation: LinkedIn member: Of course I don’t imagine […]
The fundamentals of the Chinese steel markets do not support the recent surge in iron ore prices, according to Goldman Sachs and Li Xinchuang, deputy secretary of the China Iron and Steel Association (CISA). Iron ore prices rose earlier this week on an expectation that new government measures to stimulate the economy would result in […]
Steel buyers are becoming resigned to the fact that steel prices bottomed back in December and the expectation is for prices to go higher from here – even benchmark hot rolled coil. Last week the domestic steel mills announced a $30 per ton price increase. Since then the discussion within the industry has been where […]
In Sunday evening’s issue of Steel Market Update we warned our readers that something was happening in China that could impact US steel prices. We have been working on this project ever since and this is what we have learned from multiple sources around the world: Iron ore and steel prices are surging in China. […]
Steel prices have surged in the Chinese domestic market over the past few days. Steel Market Update reported in our Final Thoughts on Sunday evening that something was up and buyers needed to be aware of what is going on around them – both here in North America as well as around the world. Volatility […]
As negotiations between the domestic steel mills and their ferrous scrap suppliers conclude we are seeing scrap prices rise with the Chicago markets “catching up” with some of the other regions. Dealers are reporting robust sales, especially to sheet mills as they are picking up spot market share from the integrated mills. Chicago area prices […]
One of the key items Steel Market Update reports on twice a month to our Premium level members is the manufacturing view of service center spot pricing and the distributors’ view of how their companies are handling spot pricing into the end users. From this report we are able to determine if domestic mill price […]
For the week ending March 5, 2016, the American Iron & Steel Institute (AISI) estimated the U.S. steel industry produced 1,673,000 net tons of raw steel, a 1.1 percent decrease over the previous week but a 2.6 percent increase over the same week one year ago. The estimated capacity utilization rate is 71.5 percent, down […]
The US Department of Commerce released final census data for January foreign steel imports earlier today. January imports came in at 2,648,218 net tons, about 300,000 more tons than what we saw for the month of December 2015. Even so, January 2016 imports were well below the 4,393,498 tons received during January 2015. February 2016 […]
World Steel Exchange Marketing (WSEM) announced that the US Shredded Steel Scrap TSI Index will begin futures trading on the Nasdaq Commodities Exchange (Stockholm) as of March 29, 2016. The 20-gross-ton USA Midwest shredded steel contract will be listed, and quoted, for the current month and each of the next 11 months. The contract will […]
The market is weighing the latest attempt by the domestic steel mills to raise flat rolled steel prices. Virtually every mill has come out with spot market price increase announcements of $30 per ton on hot rolled, cold rolled, galvanized and Galvalume steels. However, there are a couple of mills that have very little spot […]
One of the first things that happen as flat rolled steel prices begin to firm the lower end of the range of pricing available begins to move higher. This is what happened to our numbers this past week. In many cases the lower end of the range moved up while the upper end of the […]
Steel Market Update posted one of our articles from Thursday evening’s issue of our newsletter (Steel Market Update Publisher Quoted Around the World) and in the process comments were made that started a debate on a subject SMU has addressed in the past: the purchase of foreign steel slabs by domestic steel mills. After the […]
There has been some confusion in the marketplace as many mills were waiting for Nucor and SDI to come out with new price announcements after SSAB and ArcelorMittal led the way earlier this week. On Tuesday, NLMK USA representatives began verbally informing their customers that their spot prices on hot rolled, cold rolled and galvanized […]
The following article on the hot rolled coil (HRC), busheling scrap (BUS), and financial futures markets was written by Dave Feldstein. As Flack Steel’s director of risk management, David Feldstein 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 […]
It was only a few weeks ago that many within the ferrous scrap community felt when the negotiations were over for the month of March and the smoke cleared scrap prices would be essentially unchanged from February. That was then, this is now. One of the larger players in the market told us earlier today, […]
With the US Department of Commerce making their initial (preliminary determination) ruling on antidumping (AD) we thought our readers might enjoy a deeper dive into understanding cold rolled exports out of the seven countries affected by the ruling. We decided to begin looking at CR imports beginning in 2010, which was one of the years […]
Steel Market Update had to go back into our records to dig out when foreign steel imports were reported to be less than 2.3 million net tons. The reason we were searching was based on our analysis of the U.S. Department of Commerce foreign steel import license data released earlier this week. Based on license […]
Spot flat rolled steel prices were adjusted higher by Steel Market Update based on the data being collected out of our ongoing flat rolled steel survey as well as through direct contact with steel buyers. We found a tight cluster of hot rolled offers in the $400 to $410 range. Our average increased due to […]
SSAB, which is known primarily as a plate supplier, announced a $30 per ton price increase on plate and hot rolled coil in the United States and a $40 per ton price increase on hot rolled. The SSAB increases were sent via an emailed letter to their customers. The letter began, “Please be advised that […]
Steel Market Update received the following information about the ferrous scrap markets in Asia and Turkey from Damon Sun of Daido International: There has been aggressive movements in the ferrous scrap markets in Asia and Turkey in recent days. Off the East Coast, Turkish scrap prices are up $12-$15/mt and on the Asian region side, […]
For the week ending February 27, 2016, the American Iron & Steel Institute (AISI) estimated the U.S. steel industry produced 1,692,000 net tons of raw steel, a 0.4 percent decrease over the previous week and a 0.8 percent decrease over the same week one year ago. The estimated capacity utilization rate is 72.4 percent, down […]
Flat rolled & Plate prices have been moving mostly sideways over the past few weeks as little has happened to propel prices higher (or lower) from here. Hot rolled prices have been stuck in the $400-$410 per ton range with SteelBenchmarker at the lower end of the range while SMU ($405) and Platts ($407.50) rounding […]
The American Institute for International Steel reports preliminary steel imports increased significantly to start the year, but they remained far below the level of early 2015. The rest of the press from AIIS follows: Imports grew by 10 percent from December to January, reaching 2.58 million net tons. This, though, was 41.4 percent less than […]
The following article on the hot rolled coil (HRC), busheling scrap (BUS), and financial futures markets was written by Jack Marshall of Crunch Risk LLC. Here is how Jack saw trading over the past week: Steel (HRC) The CME HR spot month future settlement reflects minimal price movements in physical markets this month as the […]
The following calculation is used by Steel Market Update to identify the spread between world hot rolled export prices as determined by SteelBenchmarker and domestic (US) hot rolled prices as published by SMU. Steel Market Update compares the world hot rolled export price to which dollars are added for freight, handling, trader margin, etc. The number […]
Steel Market Update has been speaking with various scrap sources to see what the market trend looks like as we head into March ferrous scrap pricing negotiations. Virtually all dealers are of the opinion that the market looks to be sideways (same pricing as February) with maybe a little “lean” toward the upside. The dealers […]
Steel Market Update asked steel buyers how they were seeing the flat rolled steel market so far this week. One large Midwest based service center told us, “Eerily quiet.” Other buyers basically provided the same guidance. Hot rolled order books continue to be weak to moderate while cold rolled and coated lead times are extended […]
There has been too little attention paid to the passage of the ENFORCE Act by the U.S. Congress a few weeks back. At least that is how trade attorney Lewis Leibowitz sees it. He warned those at our 2015 Steel Summit Conference that the domestic steel mills were trying to build a “dam” against steel […]
The U.S. Department of Commerce updated foreign steel import license data this afternoon (February 23rd). Based on a daily license rate of 81,355 tons, February is trending toward 2.2-2.3 million tons. This is slightly lower than the 2.4 million ton pace we saw based on license data through the 16th of February. At 2.3 million […]