Existing-home sales slowed in April amidst an environment of push-pull housing demand, according to the National Association of Realtors (NAR). Total sales in all regions were down both month on month (MoM) and year on year (YoY). April’s seasonally adjusted annual rate (SAAR) of sales at 4.28 million, was off 3.4% from March’s rate and down […]
Networking is an integral part of life in the business world. Emails, phone calls, and even Zoom meetings are nice, but they can only take us so far. Getting out and about, shaking hands and meeting others face-to-face – this is what really allows us to form relationships with customers, contacts, and even competitors. It […]
The price spread between hot-rolled sheet and steel plate rose for the sixth consecutive week as hot-rolled prices continued their descent and plate prices remained relatively stable, according to SMU’s price indices published last Tuesday. SMU’s hot-rolled coil index averaged $1,040 per net ton ($52.00 per cwt) in the latest market check on May 16. […]
Indian steelmaker JSW reported its results for its fiscal fourth quarter and financial year ended March 31, noting a sequential rise in quarterly shipments and sales at its JSW Steel USA operations. JSW Steel USA’s Mingo Junction, Ohio, mill operated at 64% of capacity during Q4, producing 86,203 metric tons of HRC and 231,908 metric […]
United Auto Workers (UAW) members at a Constellium plant in Michigan are on strike after failing to reach a labor agreement with the aluminum products producer. 160 members of UAW Local 174 at Constellium’s automotive structures plant in Van Buren, Mich., opted to strike as of May 17 “after weeks of the company refusing to […]
Single-family housing starts are showing gradual improvement so far this year, according to the National Association of Home Builders (NAHB), which looked at data from the US Department of Housing and Urban Development and the US Census Bureau. Overall housing starts, at a seasonally adjusted annual rate (SAAR) of 1.4 million units in April, were […]
The latest Empire State Manufacturing Survey shows a steep decline in business activity in the state of New York. The headline manufacturing general business conditions index from the Federal Reserve Bank of New York fell into the negative, dropping by nearly 43 points to -31.8 in the survey taken between May 2-9. The April index […]
Nucor has taken another step toward using nuclear power to fuel its electric-arc furnace (EAF) steel mills. The Charlotte, N.C.-based steelmaker has signed a memorandum of understanding (MoU) with NuScale Power to evaluate co-locating NuScale’s VOYGR™ small modular nuclear reactor (SMR) power plants near Nucor’s mills. Doing so would provide carbon-free electricity to the mills […]
Tampa, Fla. is now home to the North American headquarters of refractory provider RHI Magnesita. With operations in 37 countries, the Vienna, Austria-based company is a global provider of high-grade refractory products used in the steel, cement, non-ferrous metal, and glass industries. The new corporate hub in Tampa will serve customers in the US, Canada, […]
Mississauga, Ontario-based service center group Russel Metals reported sequential improvement in its business segments in the first quarter, while results weakened year over year. The company reported Q1 net income of Canadian $73.9 million (US$55.2 million) on sales of nearly CA$1.2 billion compared to net income of CA$98.7 million on sales of CA$1.34 billion in […]
Import duties on welded pipe and tube from a handful of countries are likely to remain in place for another five years, pending final injury determinations in two sunset reviews. The US Department of Commerce recently completed two expedited sunset review cases: one of antidumping duties on welded carbon steel pipe and tube from India, […]
The Dodge Momentum Index (DMI) declined for the second month in a row in April as office, hotel, and retail planning activity showed weakness, the latest data from the Dodge Construction Network (DCN) shows. The reading is at its lowest level in eight months. April’s DMI declined 5.1% to 180.9 from the revised March reading […]
Licenses to import steel into the US declined from March to April, with all major flat-rolled product categories showing month-on-month (MoM) declines, according to the latest figures from the Department of Commerce’s US Steel Import Monitor. Import licenses totaled more than 2.292 million net tons in April. This was a 12% drop from March’s final import […]
Weather events significantly disrupted commodity markets in 2022, fueling already significant price volatility. La Niña has ended in Australia, but other weather events and permanent climate change continue to impact global commodity supply chains. Weather – A Significant Disruptor in 2022 Heightened seasonal weather and extreme weather events disrupted multiple commodity markets in 2022. Heavy […]
The most recent cycle of destocking has ended, ArcelorMittal said, with first-quarter sales and shipments rising notably from the prior quarter, boosted by strength in the North American region. Those figures remain lower, however, compared to highs seen in the year-ago quarter. The Luxembourg-based global steelmaking giant posted Q1 net income of $1.096 billion, a […]
Northwest Pipe reported a drop in first-quarter earnings but is optimistic on the remainder of the year. The Vancouver, Wash.-based pipe producer saw Q1 net income dropped 34% from the year-ago quarter to $2.4 million, with sales down 9% to $99.1 million. “As we expected, the first quarter was challenging due to severe weather events […]
The Great Lakes Clean Hydrogen Coalition (GLCH) has officially submitted its full application for federal funding to create a $2-billion clean hydrogen hub in the Midwest. GLCH’s plan is to develop a hub to serve Ohio, Michigan, and portions of Pennsylvania and Indiana to help industries in the region decarbonize. Cleveland-Cliffs already has plans to […]
Lower metal prices resulted in a 15% year-on-year decline in first-quarter sales for Duisburg, Germany-based service center group Klöckner & Co. Klöckner, which has a large presence in the US, had warned of lower metals prices in its Q4 earnings report. Q1 sales still amounted to €2.08 billion million (US$2.29 billion), but earnings fell into […]
Alro Metals Outlet has opened a new retail location in northern Indiana. The new 17,500-square-foot outlet located in Elkhart, Ind., stocks a variety of carbon steel, aluminum, stainless steel, tool steel, copper, brass, and plastic products. Alro aims to make metal buying simple for businesses and individual customers with its outlet locations, where no minimum […]
Ryerson saw strong shipments on better-than-expected demand during the first quarter, but weaker prices resulted in lower earnings for the Chicago-based service center group. “Ryerson produced good operating results during a period of better-than-expected composite demand and price support,” company president and CEO Eddie Lehner said. Q1 sales of $1.4 billion increased 9.2% sequentially, driven […]
The US manufacturing sector looks to have contracted for another month, albeit at a slightly slower pace than in March, according to the latest monthly report on business from the Institute for Supply Management (ISM). The ISM’s manufacturing PMI came in at 47.1% in April. Although 0.8 percentage points higher than the previous month, the […]
Scottsdale, Ariz.-based Reliance Steel & Aluminum Co. has made its first acquisition of 2023, announcing the addition of Southern Steel Supply Co. to its portfolio of service center companies. Southern Steel Supply is based in Memphis, Tenn., supplying merchant and structural steel, pipe and tube, steel plate, ornamental products, and laser-cut and fabricated parts to […]
U.S. Steel is bullish on the automotive market and believes it is well positioned to continue gaining market share in that important steel-consuming sector. Auto OEMs desire to have their advanced high-strength (AHSS) and automotive-grade steels produced more sustainably, said Kevin Lewis, U.S. Steel’s VP of finance, speaking on the company’s first-quarter earnings conference call […]
US plate producers are seeking to have the suspension agreement on Russian plate imports tossed and to be replaced with antidumping duties (AD). Nucor, Cleveland-Cliffs, and SSAB have asked the US Department of Commerce to terminate the AD suspension agreement on carbon steel plate from Russia. The producers say that the agreement is no longer […]
Mexico is benefiting from the trend of the reshoring of manufacturing as companies work to secure reliable supply chains and be closer to their end markets. As a result, Ternium’s Mexican operations are seeing increasing shipments and market share. Company executives discussed this and other topics on the company’s first-quarter earnings conference call on Wednesday, […]
Cleveland-Cliffs Inc. has reached a tentative labor agreement with Local 1943 of the International Association of Machinists and Aerospace Workers (IAM) at its Middletown Works in Ohio. Pending ratification by the union, the new four-year contract will be effective on May 15 and will cover 2,100 hourly employees. “The new labor agreement with our valued […]
Despite high interest rates dampening demand, strength in manufacturing across the globe will drive a rebound in steel demand this year, the World Steel Association (worldsteel) said in its April 2023 Short Range Outlook. “In 2022, recovery momentum after the pandemic shock was hampered by high inflation and increasing interest rates, the Russian invasion of […]
The US Department of Commerce has made initial decisions in several duty circumvention cases involving pipe and tube products from Asia. The department preliminarily found affirmative instances of duty circumvention in six out of seven investigations, according to filings with the Federal Register. In all the cases, Vietnam is the country in which pipe and tube […]
Russian mining and steel company Metalloinvest has been added to the US sanctions list. On April 12, the US Department of Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control imposed the sanctions targeting the vast holdings of one of Russia’s wealthiest billionaires, Alisher Usmanov, including Moscow-based Metalloinvest and its parent company USM Holdings. The measures are meant […]
An upgrade to JSW Steel USA’s mill in Mingo Junction, Ohio, is reportedly in the works. The company has proposed a $160 million investment for the mill, according to Samir Kapadia, principal at Vogel Group and lobbyist for JSW in Washington. Kapadia recently met with Parth Jindal, heir of India’s JSW Steel (of which JSW […]