Last week Steel Market Update adjusted our Price Momentum Indicator from Lower to Neutral. We believe that change is coming and the wholesale slide we have seen in flat rolled steel prices will come to an end. We have not yet come to the conclusion that prices will reverse direction, rather that prices on hot […]
According to Baker Hughes data from March 27th, 2015, the U.S rig count for the week was 1,048 rigs exploring for or developing oil or natural gas. The rig count is down 21 rigs when compared to last week, with oil rigs down 12 to 813 rigs, gas rigs down 9 to 233 rigs, and […]
Earlier today, Steel Market Update adjusted our SMU Price Momentum Indicator from “Lower” to “Neutral.” Since November 16, 2014 the SMU Price Momentum Indicator has been pointing toward “Lower” steel prices. Prior to November 16th we had a period of time where our Momentum Indicator vacillated between Neutral and Lower going back to May 2014. […]
The current downward cycle is getting a little “long in the tooth” (old) and there are signs that even with the short lead times and excessive inventories at the service centers the domestic steel mills are not chasing business but rather negotiating for specific pieces of business with known tonnages and want dates. The mills […]
This morning Steel Market Update (SMU) participated in the monthly galvanized steel conference call hosted by HARDI. The conference call is for those HARDI wholesalers who sell galvanized sheet and coil to the HVAC mechanical contractors around the United States and Canada. Since the last conference call held during the later days in February, galvanized […]
One of the most import keys being watched by buyers and sellers of flat rolled steel are the steel mill lead times on hot rolled, cold rolled, galvanized and Galvalume products. Lead times, which are the amount of time it takes to get material produced once a purchase order is placed, have been running “short” […]
Based on the results from our most recent flat rolled steel market analysis which we conducted this past week, manufacturing companies and service centers reported domestic (USA and Canada) steel mills as willing to negotiate pricing on hot rolled, cold rolled, galvanized and Galvalume steel coils. As you can see by the graphic shared below, […]
According to Baker Hughes data from March 20th, 2015, the U.S rig count for the week was 1,069 rigs exploring for or developing oil or natural gas. The rig count is down 56 rigs when compared to last week, with oil rigs down 41 to 825 rigs, gas rigs down 15 to 242 rigs, and […]
According to the Precision Metalforming Association (PMA) Business Conditions Report for March 2015, little change is expected in general business conditions during the next three months. PMA manufacturing members expect new orders to be the same or slightly higher in the coming months. Shipping levels were reported as steady in the March report and average […]
Not to toot our own horn too loudly, we came within a whisker of nailing both shipments and inventories in our last Service Center Inventory Apparent Excess/Deficit forecast. In our last forecast we indicated flat rolled shipments would be 2,253,000 tons and based on the MSCI data released earlier this week the actual number was […]
The quick slide to the bottom slowed over the last 7 days with cold rolled and Galvalume steel prices unchanged, galvanized is down $5 per ton and hot rolled is down $10 per ton compared to last Tuesday evening. Hot rolled is now within the range predicted by Timna Tanners of Bank of America Merrill […]
The domestic steel mills are resorting to adjustments in supply as a weapon against the chronic short lead times which are helping to push flat rolled steel prices lower and lower. The heavy lifting is being done by the integrated steel mills, especially by U.S. Steel which has taken three blast furnaces down over the […]
I thought I would wait for my Final Thoughts area of the newsletter before broaching the rumor mill which has been begun questioning at what point do the domestic steel mills go out into the market and announce price increases. I had a number of conversations over the past few days with both consumers of […]
Last week the pace of the decline in flat rolled steel prices was relatively modest, most being in the single digits and in some cases there was no decline in our averages at all. There was some talk about “the bottom” of the market around the industry but, the inventory over-hang was just there and […]
Lead times on flat rolled products remained less than stellar based on the results of our last flat rolled steel market analysis conducted this past week. The respondents to our steel survey pegged hot rolled lead times as averaging 2.92 weeks, statistically unchanged from what we saw as an average during the middle of February. […]
Buyers and sellers of flat rolled steel have been advising Steel Market Update during our flat rolled steel market survey process that the domestic steel mills are willing to negotiate steel prices. Since the beginning of the year the percentage of agreement amongst our respondents (which average 110 to 170 companies) has been almost unanimous. […]
SMU had the opportunity to attend the Association of Steel Distributors (ASD) meeting in Pittsburgh on March 5. The meeting was held at the delightfully decorated Hotel Monaco in downtown Pittsburgh. ASD president Brian Robbins welcomed the younger than usual attendees to the ASD meeting and invited them to become part of the Future Leaders […]
According to Baker Hughes data from March 6th, 2015, the U.S rig count for the week was 1,192 rigs exploring for or developing oil or natural gas. The rig count is down 75 rigs when compared to last week, with oil rigs down 64 to 922 rigs, gas rigs down 12 to 268 rigs, and […]
Steel Market Update hot rolled average pricing broke through $500 this week as we saw HRC prices as being $5 per ton lower than one week ago. When looking at the market as a whole we are seeing a slowdown or flattening of the downward price movement. Cold rolled saw the spread between the high […]
We made a mistake in our most recent issue when we referenced $440 as being the low for hot rolled back in June 2009. That was actually the low for the galvanized base price (noted in the HARDI article in that same issue). The low for hot rolled in June 2009 was $380 per ton […]
Hot rolled prices continued lower this week with the CRU down $9 to $508/ton with HRC futures following suit. Q2 has been trading around $510/ton with March trading as low as $503/ton – $13 lower than the week prior. The second half of 2015 is reasonably higher with Q3 and Q4 both trading around $535/ton. […]
We are seeing the benchmark hot rolled coil average as sitting right on the critical $500 per ton mark this week. Most steel buyers with whom we speak are of the opinion that hot rolled coil will drop below $500 per ton within the next week or two. The question then becomes how far down […]
Based on the most recent flat rolled steel market survey results, steel mill lead times stabilized this past week after having declined almost non-stop since August 2014. The question now is will the mill lead times begin to move out from here or remain stuck at these less than desirable levels (from a mill perspective […]
Lead times may be showing signs of reaching a bottom (too early to tell if only a dead cat bounce) but there is no question that the steel mills are willing to negotiate pricing on all flat rolled products. We have been hearing it from the flat rolled steel buyers and executives as we speak […]
Have I mentioned lately that our next Steel 101 workshop will be held in the Chicago area and will include a tour of the NLMK Indiana mini-mill? Details are on our website or you are welcome to contact our offices at: 800-432-3475 or info@SteelMarketUpdate.com. We believe this will be another excellent program as we bring […]
Steel Market Update last Apparent Excess/Deficit forecast for flat rolled steel shipments and inventories called for shipments in January to exceed 2014 levels by 2 percent. Total flat rolled shipments for the month of January 2015 were projected by us to be 2,415,000 tons. In actuality, shipment levels were 1.6 percent higher than January 2014 […]
We received a very mixed bag when it came to hot rolled pricing this week. Our range expanded from the $490-$530 we reported last week to $480-$550 this week. Our HR average actually rose by $5 compared to one week ago. We are not ready to announce prices as having “bottomed,” as one renegade mill […]
Steel Market Update received a question from one of our readers regarding a comment we made in Tuesday evening’s issue during our analysis of flat rolled steel pricing. The comment was about the domestic mills negotiating away extras and how this was impacting transactional pricing. All of the indexes are suppose to take into consideration […]
Traders at the Port of Tampa Steel Conference told me hot rolled offers at in the $460 to $480 per ton range with little to no activity. It is not clear yet if the import offers will move lower from the $460 to $480 level. One trader told me that they were not taking any […]
Flat rolled steel buyers are resigned to a steel price spot market which takes benchmark hot rolled prices below the $500 per ton ($25.00/cwt) level. One of the large hot rolled service centers this morning told Steel Market Update that they were having a difficult time keeping up with the pace of the falling numbers. […]