The prices of oil and natural gas drive the consumption of oil country tubular goods (OCTG) and related steel products. The energy markets represent a large portion of the hot rolled coil used to make pipe and tube as well as equipment used to drill and pump oil and natural gas. Figure 1 shows historical […]
This article was previously published on Wednesday, January 11th for our Premium level members. We are sharing this article with our Executive level members as we thought it would be interesting to look at our 2016 import analysis and then be aware that we have much more data available in our website for our Premium […]
In the first eleven months of 2016, total ferrous steel scrap exports were 11,428,000 tonnes, down by 11.8 percent from the first 11 months of 2015. The tonnages shown in Figure 1 are based on three month moving averages for 2016 and on the annual monthly average for previous years. The graph shows that exports […]
We believe that misinformation (or lack of) about regional steel 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 for premium subscribers. We are now […]
The Bureau of Labor Statistics employment reports, both national and regional, are fundamental to our understanding of where the various steel consuming sectors are headed. In this analysis we are examining multiple data sources to try to develop a broad base of understanding. This data complements other more specific information on construction and manufacturing activities […]
Licensed data for December was reported by the Steel Import Monitoring System of the US Commerce Department on January 3rd. An explanation of the methodology that use at SMU to analyze the trade data is given at the end of this piece. All volumes in this analysis are reported in short tons. In December, on […]
Each month the Commerce Department issues its Construction Put in Place (CPIP) data, usually on the first working day covering activity two months earlier. November data for CPIP was released on Tuesday, January 3rd. The most notable feature of this update was the apparent response to the $305 billion infrastructure in the bill that Congress […]
An explanation of the Key Indicators concept is given at the end of this piece for those readers who are unfamiliar with it. This will explain the difference between our view of the present situation which is subjective and our analysis of trends which is based on the latest facts available. Looking back from the […]
Please see the end of this report for an explanation of data sources. The Broad Index value of the US $ is reported several days in arrears by the Federal Reserve, the latest value published was dated December 16th, Figure 1. The dollar as of that date was stronger than at any time since April […]
The source of this data is the Conference Board with analysis by Steel Market Update. The official news release from the Conference Board is included beneath our analysis. Please see the end of this piece for an explanation of the indicator. The December report was very encouraging and came on the heels of an excellent […]
For the first time this month we will summarize six data sources that describe the state of manufacturing in the US. We have reported on most of these six sources separately in our Steel Market Update publications therefore will be brief in this summary. We don’t expect these data sources to all point in the […]
This is our first ever write up of global scrap trade. We believe that to understand the gyrations of the domestic scrap market we should study where the US stands as a global player. This data is not very current because some nations are slow to report but we still believe it gives a valuable […]
Vehicle sales fell slightly to 17.87 million units on a seasonally adjusted annualized basis in November, though this still beat expectations. The strengthening job market is supporting vehicle sales and will continue to do so through next year as an average of 170,000 jobs are estimated to be added per month. On the other side […]
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 […]
The prices of oil and natural gas drive the consumption of oil country tubular goods (OCTG) and related steel products. The energy markets represent a large portion of the hot rolled coil used to make pipe and tube as well as equipment used to drill and pump oil and natural gas. On December 12th Gaurav […]
November service center daily shipments declined by 3.7 percent from October which was disappointing because since 2009 on average November has declined by 2.1 percent. Carbon steel shipments decreased by 107,400 tons, the number of shipping days was unchanged at 21 and tons/day shipments decreased by 5,100 tons. Intake and shipments In November total carbon […]
The Bureau of Economic Analysis (BEA) introduced a new data set for GDP by state and region in 2014 and back dated it to Q1 2005. Last week the data was updated through Q2 2016. Even though we might consider this to be historically “old,” we think it’s worth reporting because it is a foundation […]
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 […]
This report summarizes total steel supply from 2003 through October 2016 and year on year changes. It then compares domestic mill shipments and total supply to the market. It quantifies market direction by product and enables a side by side comparison of the degree to which imports have absorbed demand. Sources are the American Iron […]
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 […]
Each month the Commerce Department issues its Construction Put in Place (CPIP) data, usually on the first working day covering activity two months earlier. October data for CPIP was released on Thursday December 1st. The tables in this report don’t look so good but in fact the single month of October looked a lot better […]
In November net job creation was 178,000 which was about in line with analysts’ expectations. The employment situation is strong enough for the Fed to likely go ahead with a target rate increase later this month. September employment numbers were revised up by 17,000 and October down by 19,000. Using a three month moving average […]
The source of this data is the Conference Board with analysis by Steel Market Update. This article is normally reserved for our Premium level members but we are sharing it with all of our readers in an effort to give you some taste of what kind of analysis you get with a Premium membership to […]
An explanation of the Key Indicators concept is given at the end of this piece for those readers who are unfamiliar with it. This will explain the difference between our view of the present situation which is subjective and our analysis of trends which is based on the latest facts available. At the end of […]
Both these data points are reported in the Federal Reserve G17 data base. The three month moving average (3MMA) of the index had an all-time high of 106.28 in December 2014 and trended down through June this year when it experienced a three month turnaround followed by a slight decline in October to 104.32. Figure […]
Once each quarter we publish the official statistics for Chinese GDP, industrial production, consumer price inflation and fixed asset investment. Currently available GDP data is through the third quarter, other data included here is through October. Many analysts don’t believe these Party self-serving figures but we include them in our reports because of the importance […]
Vehicle sales rose to 18.0 million on a seasonally adjusted annual rate basis in October. This was the best result since November last year. Average monthly sales in the first ten months of 2016 have been 17.4 million units. A pace above the 17 million SAAR rate should continue through next year as the labor […]
The World Steel Association (WSA) released their provisional October update of global steel production on Friday with the proviso that several countries were late in reporting. When this happens they plug in the missing numbers and, based on our review of past assumptions, we believe their preliminary report is credible. We are, therefore, going ahead […]
October service center daily shipments improved 1.0 percent from September which is better than it seems because since 2009 on average, October has declined by 2.3 percent. Carbon steel shipments increased by 29,700 tons, the number of shipping days was unchanged at 21 and tons/day shipments increased by 1,400 tons. Intake and shipments In October […]
Please see the end of this report for an explanation of data sources. The Broad Index value of the US $ is reported several days in arrears by the Federal Reserve, the latest value we have was dated November 10th, Figure 1. The dollar has appreciated strongly since the election in anticipation of higher interest […]