Contributor: Michael Cowden

It’s once again A Tale of Two Cities in the steel market. Some are almost euphoric about Trump’s victory. Others, some rather bearish, are more focused on the day-to-day market between now and Inauguration Day on Jan. 20.

SMU’s flat-rolled steel prices were mixed this week with slight declines across most products and a modest increase in prices for cold-rolled coil.

President-elect Donald Trump continues to send shockwaves through the political establishment (again). And steel markets and ferrous scrap markets continue to be, well, anything but shocking. As the French writer Jean-Baptiste Alphonse Karr wrote in 1849, "The more things change, the more they stay the same." (I thought the quote might have been Yankees catcher Yogi Berra in 1949. Google taught me something new today.)

President-elect Donald Trump will officially retake the White House on Jan. 20. I’ve been getting questions about how his administration’s policies might reshape the steel industry and domestic manufacturing. I covered the tumult and norm busting of Trump's first term: Section 232, Section 301, USMCA - and that's just on the trade policy side of things. It's safe to say that we'll have no shortage of news in 2025 when it comes to trade and tariffs.

Prices for sheet and plate products were mixed this week. While market participants have noted a post-election uptick in activity, most said that it was (so far) nothing to write home about.

Timna Tanners, managing director of equity research for Wolfe Research, will be the featured speaker on the next SMU Community Chat. The webinar will be on Wednesday, Nov. 13, at 11 am ET. It’s free to attend. You can register here. Timna – who has coined Sheet Storm, Scrap Squeeze, and Galv Galore – is one of the most popular guests on our Community Chats. Her insights and forecasts are always thought-provoking.

Votes were still being counted when this column posted on Tuesday evening. And I’d be surprised if we know who the president will be by the time some of you are reading it on Wednesday morning.

Timna Tanners, managing director of equity research for Wolfe Research, will be the featured speaker on the next SMU Community Chat. Tanners – who has coined Sheet Storm, Scrap Squeeze, and Galv Galore – is one of the most popular guests on our Community Chats. Her insights and forecasts are always thought provoking.

It’s official. U.S. Steel has made the first coil at Big River Steel 2 (BRS2). We congratulate the company and all the hard work that went into achieving that milestone. USS said BRS2 would begin shipments to customers this quarter. And we’re assuming those volumes will increase into Q1'25.

Nucor said it is seeking $740 per short ton (st) for hot-rolled (HR) coil this week, up $20/st from last week. USS, meanwhile, is shooting for up $30/st for sheet products in general. (USS did not announce a target price for HR.)

U.S. Steel plans to increase sheet prices by at least $30 per short ton (st). That's something we haven't seen for a while.

SSAB Americas plans to increase plate prices by at least $60 per short to, according to a letter to customers dated Thursday, Oct. 24. The higher prices are effective immediately for all new non-contract orders scheduled to ship on or after Dec. 2.

U.S. Steel aims to increase spot prices for all new orders of flat-rolled steel by at least $30 per short ton (st), according to an internal letter dated Thursday.

Join SMU for a Community Chat next Wednesday featuring Lewis Leibowitz, a veteran trade attorney and one of our most-read columnists. The webinar will be on Oct. 30 at 11 am ET. It’s free to attend. You can register here

SMU's hot-rolled (HR) coil price slipped this week to $685 per short ton (st) on average. We also adjusted our sheet momentum indicators to lower for the first time since July.

We had an October surprise here at SMU on Wednesday. I was working from the CRU office in Pittsburgh, and the internet connection briefly went out. As luck would have it, that happened smack in the middle of a live Community Chat webinar. Fortunately, my colleague David Schollaert stepped in, Zekelman Industries CEO Barry Zekelman rolled with the punches – and the show went on. Could there be any more October surprises in store for us and for the steel market?

Steel Dynamics Inc. (SDI) reported a drop in third-quarter profits driven largely by lower flat-rolled steel prices. The Fort Wayne, Ind.-based electric arc furnace (EAF) steelmaker also saw scrap prices slip. That happened because of softer demand from domestic mills taking planned maintenance outages.

SMU’s next Community Chat webinar will feature Barry Zekelman, executive chairman and CEO of Zekelman Industries – the largest independent steel pipe and tube manufacturer in North America. The webinar will be on Wednesday, Oct. 16, at 11 a.m. ET. It’s free to attend. A recording will be available only to SMU subscribers.

I’m trying to make sure this is not a TL;DR Final Thoughts. As a journalism school professor once told me, ‘No one but your mom reads more than 1,000 words.’ Also, as the old adage goes, a picture is worth a thousand as well. With that in mind, below are a couple of charts that I think go a long way toward explaining how prices and lead times have been relatively stable despite concerns about demand.

AZZ Inc. posted sharply higher second-quarter profits driven by increased sales of and better demand for its products. The Fort Worth, Texas-based hot-dipped galvanized and coil coater reported net income of $35.4 million in the second quarter of 2024, up 43.3% from $24.7 million in the same quarter last year. It posted Q2'24 sales of $409 million, up 2.6% from $398.5 million in Q2'23.

Nucor said it would keep plate prices unchanged in a letter to customers on Wednesday. The Charlotte, N.C.-based steelmaker in addition said it was opening its November order book for plate. The company did not specify what its plate price was. It has officially kept prices flat since cutting them by $125 per short ton (st) on July 1.

It’s another week of big headlines for the world writ large – an expanding war in the Middle East, another potentially catastrophic hurricane – and not much going on in the world of steel prices. “Call me Stevie Wonder, I see nothing.” That’s how one service center executive described the current sheet market. There seems to be almost a competition among some of our Community Chat guests and contributors to outdo each other in flowery ways to say, “

Steel sheet and plate prices moved lower this week as efforts among some mills to hold the line on tags ran up against continued concerns about demand.

The International Longshoreman's Association (ILA) union and the United States Maritime Alliance (USMX) reached a tentative agreement on wages on Thursday evening. The move ends a strike at East Coast and Gulf Coast ports that began on Tuesday and that had threatened significant supply-chain disruptions.

Another day, another massive gap between the news and market sentiment. On the news side, we’ve got war in the Middle East. The devastation facing western North Carolina coming into tragic focus. And the outcome of the presidential election remains a coin toss, according to current polling.

The United Steelworkers (USW) union has named Kevon Stewart to be director of District 6, which represents members in Ontario and Atlantic Canada. The USW said that appointment was effective on Oct. 1. It also noted that Stewart became the first black district director in the union – not only in Canada but in the United States as well.

Reliance Inc., the largest service center chain in North America, has picked Douglas Stotlar to be the next chairman of its board. The move will be effective Jan. 1, 2025. Mark Kaminski, the current chair, will then step down from that role but will remain on the board.

Join SMU’s next Community Chat webinar with Barry Zekelman, executive chairman and CEO of Zekelman Industries – the largest independent steel pipe and tube manufacturer in North America. The webinar will be on Wednesday, Oct. 16, at 11 a.m. ET. It’s free to attend. A recording will be available only to SMU subscribers.

There are markets where the headlines and the prices are both crazy. This does not appear to be one of them, at least not yet.

Flack Global Metals (FGM) Founder and CEO Jeremy Flack will sit down with SMU for a Community Chat webinar on Wednesday, Oct. 2, at 11 am ET. The live webinar is free for anyone to attend. A recording will be available only to SMU subscribers.