Buyers and sellers of flat rolled steel are slowly beginning to feel better about their company’s prospects both now and into the future, according to the results of the Steel Market Update (SMU) flat rolled steel market analysis just completed earlier today. SMU is reporting current market sentiment as being up +1 point to +44. […]
We discussed mill lead times a little earlier this week based on the first two days of data received by our flat rolled steel market analysis (survey). We also reported on what we were seeing from the mills themselves last week when we went through and analyzed a number of the lead times being published […]
The scrap markets are still sorting themselves out as the domestic steel mills and dealers jostle for position with the dealers looking like they will be the victors in this go-around for January deliveries. We are hearing early trades in Chicago as being done at up $20 per ton with one of our sources telling […]
I was speaking with a large service center which buys mostly hot rolled this afternoon. We were discussing what each of our opinions were regarding the direction of pricing and how 1st quarter will ultimately come out. In the process this executive (who buy the way will be attending our Leadership Summit Conference) told us […]
We saw very modest movement in flat rolled steel prices since we last reported prices on Tuesday, December 29th. With most buyers and steel mill commercial people on holiday our new flat rolled market analysis picked up some movement at the upper end of our range in hot rolled, a reduction of the lower end […]
When SMU was at the recent HARDI conference in December we remember that many of the executives were not interested in taking inventory positions as they felt there still could be more room to fall. From our perspective, looking at prices from a historical perspective, the domestic mills had already suffered lower prices than what […]
A quick note about December import license data reported as of this evening: Vietnam for December has requested 63,932 net tons of import licenses. Of those 42,114 net tons are cold rolled and 11,787 net tons are galvanized.The average for cold rolled and galvanized exports from Vietnam over the past twelve months was less than […]
The flat rolled steel price roller coaster did not do the steel mills or companies holding inventory any favors this past year. We saw hot rolled prices drop from just below $650 per net ton (average) at the beginning of the year to the low point of $360 per ton achieved the week of December […]
The various indexes followed by Steel Market Update each produced new prices this past week. There was minimal price movement due to the Christmas and end of the year holidays which impacted the number of actual transactions occurring between the steel mills and their customers. Both Platts and Steel Market Update kept prices unchanged compared […]
The first thing that jumps out at you when taking a look at the December steel and economic data is the change in the direction flat rolled steel prices took early in the month as the domestic steel mills raised prices for the first time since the Spring 2015 (which resulted in a dead cat […]
I want to take a moment to welcome everyone back to your offices and back to the daily reality that is the steel business. I think everyone is happy that 2015 is behind us and that everyone is looking forward to a new year and new opportunities. I will keep it brief this evening as […]
This is normally the week when many buyers (and sellers) of steel tend to take an extended holiday and this year is no exception. Without a large number of price points to reference we have chosen to keep our prices in line with what we reported this past week. Here is how we see spot […]
Spot lead times have begun to move out according to the lead time sheets shared with customers this week by their domestic mill suppliers. The most strength was seen in cold rolled and coated steels while hot rolled lead times remained stuck at 3-4 weeks in most cases. Steel buyers continue to prognosticate that there […]
Steel Market Update and Platts both saw hot rolled prices as rising modestly by the end of last week. Platts is now $12.5 per ton higher than SMU as we are still getting reports of prices struggling to move higher on HRC. SteelBenchmarker did not report pricing this past week as they only report twice […]
The US Department of Commerce released the latest license data regarding foreign steel imports into the United States for the month of December 2015. Based on licenses data December is trending toward the low 2 million net tons to as much as 2.6 million net tons. However, we have noticed that the trend recently has […]
Based on the Preliminary License Data recently released by the U.S. Department of Commerce, foreign steel imports for the month of November were 2,350,942 net tons. This is the lowest total seen for any month since December 2011 when 2,064,143 net tons were reported. November 2015 imports were 1,343,207 tons less than November 2014 when […]
Last week the U.S. Department of Commerce announced the Preliminary Determination of the Antidumping (AD) portion of the CORE (corrosion resistant – galvanized, Galvalume, aluminized, etc.) trade suit. We have received a number of questions/comments regarding the actual impact of the various rulings and what the ultimate cash deposits (not duties yet) will be. Last […]
This is the last issue of Steel Market Update for this calendar year. We will not publish an issue on Thursday as it is New Year’s Eve and we will all be out celebrating what we hope will be a much stronger New Year. our offices will be open on Wednesday and for the first […]
Late this afternoon the US Department of Commerce released their Preliminary Determination regarding antidumping of corrosion resistant steels from China, India, Taiwan, Korea and Italy. China was smacked the hardest and received margins of 255.80 percent while India (6.64-6.92%), Korea (2.99-3.51%) and Italy (0.0-3.11%) were slapped on the wrists. Taiwan received no antidumping margin what-so-ever. […]
Steel Market Update is seeing prices as being modestly higher than they were both two weeks ago as well as last week. On average, cold rolled and coated steels have the most strength with lead times on many of these products having extended into February (and some coated into March) at most of the mills […]
Scrap dealers are optimistic that ferrous scrap prices have bottomed in all regions of the country and will rise as we move into negotiations for the month of January. A rising scrap market is a harbinger of good things for the steel mills as they attempt to collect the increases already announced and perhaps add […]
The U.S. Department of Commerce released import license data through the 22nd of December. The data continues to show the trend to be similar to that of November when approximately 2.7 million net tons of foreign steel were exported to the United States. In the graphic below we have highlighted hot rolled (trending lower), cold […]
The news today (late today) is all about the antidumping Preliminary Determination announcement made by the U.S. Department of Commerce. China hit hard (they don’t participate as they think they are going to get hit no matter what), Taiwan nothing and the others (Korea, India and Italy) were hit with modest AD duties. The battle […]
On Friday, SMU was speaking with the CEO of a Midwest-based service center who was advising us that, in his opinion, based on the conversations he was having with his mill suppliers, we should expect more flat rolled steel price increases to come. The mills were already asking his company for more and the mills’ […]
We are at the point of the turn and watching how quickly each index reports the change. From Steel Market Update’s view, we saw all flat rolled products pricing rising this past week and we expect most, if not all, of the price increase announcements made to be collected by the domestic steel mills and […]
This will be a busy week – at least the beginning of the week. We have the US Department of Commerce scheduled to release Preliminary Determinations on Heavy Walled Rectangular Welded Carbon Pipes and Tubes from Turkey on Monday. On Tuesday (vote will be on Monday) the US DOC is scheduled to release antidumping (AD) […]
The U.S. Department of Commerce released their Preliminary Determination for Countervailing Duty (CVD) on Cold Rolled products as well as Critical Circumstances on Cold Rolled. The headline is China was found to be receiving subsidies at a rate of 227.29 percent. They also found critical circumstances for the following companies: Angang Group Hong Kong Co., […]
On July 28, 2015 the U.S. steel mills filed antidumping and countervailing duty trade suits on cold rolled steels against China, Brazil, Russia, India and Korea. Of the countries named, China was by far the largest exporter of cold rolled steel to the United States and the country with the biggest target on its back. […]
The domestic steel mills began raising flat rolled steel prices late last week and into this week. We saw a mild rise in our hot rolled, cold rolled, galvanized and Galvalume indices as the domestic mills began to collect at least a portion of the announced increases. As we canvass the buyers and sellers of […]
Late Tuesday afternoon the U.S. Department of Commerce released updated import license data for December. Based on the data through the first 15 days of the month it appears December imports will be very similar to November. We remind our readers that license data this early in the month should be taken with a grain […]