Following the DOC determination of AD/CVD duties on imports of stainless steel products, China issued a statement expressing its disappointment that the United States continues to follow its path of protectionism. “China is disappointed that the United States continued to launch high taxes on Chinese steel export products and calls into question the unfair way […]
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 […]
The ISM Report on Business indicates expansion of economic activity in the U.S. manufacturing sector and a 92nd month of growth for the overall economy. The Institute for Supply Management report showed the January manufacturing PMI at 56 percent, an increase of 1.5 percentage points from December. Almost all of the components of the PMI […]
Nucor Corporation plans to help the new administration bring manufacturing back to America. It is off to a good start by posting solid earnings results for fourth quarter 2016. Nucor announced consolidated net earnings of $159.6 million for fourth quarter 2016 compared to $305.4 million in third quarter and a loss of $187.5 million a […]
Today is the last day in the month of January 2017. The following is our monthly review of key data collected by Steel Market Update during the month including a number of our own proprietary indices and indicators. SMU Price Momentum is ending the month pointing toward higher prices ahead. We do admit that there […]
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 January 20th (Figure 1). The dollar had a recent peak of 128.9627 on January 3rd which was the […]
The headline report of GDP growth in Q4 came in at 1.88 percent a decline from 3.53 percent in the third quarter. GDP is measured and reported in chained 2009 dollars and in the first estimate of Q4 was $16.805 trillion. The growth calculation is misleading because it takes the quarter over quarter change and […]
U.S. steel manufacturers were successful in using trade cases to reduce steel imports into the United States, said AIIS. The report on steel imports from AIIS follows: Falls Church, VA. January 27, 2017. Steel imports dipped 4.2 percent from November, coming in at 2.68 million net tons in December. Despite the month-to-month decline, the total […]
Are steel prices poised to give back some of the gains collected over the past few months? Steel Market Update and our readers have been debating this subject as word of mills being more receptive to negotiate steel pricing has been leaking out into the market. On Tuesday of this week, SMU published an article […]
Steel Market Update (SMU) received the following question from one of our readers: “We are a galvanized sheet metal fabricator. We purchase around 5 million pounds a year (mostly 26ga-14ga). I was hoping you could help us out. We have not had to raise prices in years but galvanized pricing has steady risen over the […]
Steel Dynamics announced net income of $20 million for fourth quarter 2016. Company net sales totaled $1.9 billion, down from $2.1 billion in third quarter. Operating income decreased to $239.5 million from $338.7 million in the previous quarter. Steel shipments for the quarter totaled 2.2 million; fabrication shipments totaled 131,186 tons. Average selling price for […]
January foreign steel import license data released by the U.S. Department of Commerce earlier this week is suggesting total steel imports will be in line with November and December at approximately 2.8 million net tons. We continue to see a drop in the level of hot-rolled tons coming into the U.S. market as fewer countries […]
SMU Price Momentum Indicator has been pointing to Higher flat rolled steel prices since late October (12 weeks). Based on our analysis of last week’s steel market trends survey as well as direct contact with buyers today, SMU Price Momentum has not changed and our expectation is for prices to move higher over the next […]
The following article has been revised as of 1-25-2017. Net income/loss was incorrectly reported. SMU apologizes for the confusion. AK Steel reported a net loss of $62.4 million in the fourth quarter of 2016 compared to net loss of 145.4 million in Q4 2015. Sales totaled $1.42 billion with an average selling price of $998 […]
Allegheny Technologies Inc. reported fourth quarter sales of $796 million and net income of $10 million. Flat rolled sales increased 13.2 percent year-over-year in Q4 2016 to $18.9 million, but the segment posted an operating loss of $0.8 million, improved from a loss of $120.1 million in Q4 2015. Quarter results were impacted by “weak market […]
NLMK USA sales grew 3.0 percent in 2016, said parent company NLMK due to stable customer demand, trader restocking and trade restrictions on rolled steel imports. Steel sales for 2016 totaled 1.817 million tonnes, up from 1.764 million tonnes in 2015. Total fourth quarter sales of 382,000 tonnes were down 14 percent from third quarter […]
On January 18, 2017, the Department of Commerce announced its final affirmative determinations in the antidumping and countervailing investigations of imports of cut-to-length steel plate from China. The China-wide rate for antidumping was established at 68.27 percent. The China-wide entity was assigned duties based on adverse facts for failure to cooperate with the investigation. The final subsidy […]
The Chinese represent only 7 percent of the total plate imports into the United States. The CTL plate dumping/CVD suits will now focus on the countries that represented 66 percent of the plate imports: Austria, Belgium, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, Korea and Taiwan. The Final Determination on these countries is due on March 30th. The […]
Steel Market Update participates in a monthly steel conference call hosted by HARDI (Heating, Air-conditioning, Refrigeration Distributors International). The call is dedicated to a better understanding of the galvanized steel market. The HARDI wholesalers are responsible for the supply of sheet steel and coil as well as other products to the mechanical contractors involved with […]
Late today the U.S. Department of Commerce released updated foreign steel import license data for the months of December and January. Since we are now half way through the month our interest is mainly with the month of January as we are trying to determine if there is any pull-back in flat rolled steel tonnages. […]
We were asked a question by one of our readers regarding importations of fabricated steel products. They wanted to know how can their company be assured the roll-formed products made from steels covered under the AD/CVD orders are exempt from the scope of the orders. We turned around and asked trade attorney Lewis Leibowitz to […]
The idled US Steel McKeesport Tubular mill in Pennsylvania is coming back to life in 2017. Dura-Bond Industries, a pipe manufacturer and coater headquartered in Export, PA, has leased the mill and plans to restart production after approval and upgrades are made. Jason Norris, president of Dura-Bond, confirmed the purchase of equipment from US Steel […]
The U.S. Department of Commerce (DOC) has released Final Census numbers on foreign steel imported into the United States through November 2016 and has updated license data for the month of December 2016. This provides us with our first look at imports for the year so we can do a comparison against 2015 to see […]
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 […]
According to the latest data released from the U.S. Department of Commerce and the American Iron and Steel Institute, apparent steel supply for the month of November 2016 was 8,144,758 net tons. Apparent steel supply is calculated by adding domestic steel shipments and finished US steel imports, then subtracting total US steel exports. November apparent […]
Commercial Metals Company announced net sales of $1.1 billion for earnings of $7.2 million for first quarter 2017, ending Nov. 30, 2016. Metal margins in the Americas Mills segment took a hit of 17 percent in Q1 due to lower selling prices resulting from continued import pressure, scrap price volatility and market uncertainty. Average selling price […]
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 U.S. International Trade Commission made its final affirmative determination that the U.S. steel industry was materially injured by imports of cut-to length steel plate from Brazil, South Africa, and Turkey. On January 6, 2017, the USITC determined that the products were sold at less than fair value in the U.S. but did not find […]
The steel buyers and sellers of steel who responded to our first flat rolled steel market trends survey of the New Year foretold the move by AK Steel to raise flat rolled steel prices late on Friday. Eighty-one percent of the respondents reported that they were expecting another flat rolled steel price increase (the 5th […]
On Friday, the U.S. Department of Commerce reported the Final Census numbers for November foreign steel imports into the United States. November steel imports totaled 2,805,763 net tons. This was approximately 100,000 tons higher than October. When looking at the individual items it appears the difference between the two months can be found in the […]