This evening I attended the Metals Industry Boy Scout Dinner in Chicago. The steel, and now metals industries have supported the Chicago area Boy Scouts for more than 25 years and, once again, there was close to 1,000 mostly steel people at the cocktail party and dinner. This included steel mills, service centers, trading companies, […]
HVAC wholesalers reported despite “good” demand they are seeing ultra-competitive conditions on the sales of galvanized steel they are attempting to sell into the HVAC (heating, ventilation, air-conditioning) markets. Steel Market Update participates in a monthly steel conference call hosted by HARDI (Heating, Air-conditioning, and Refrigeration Distributors International) for their member companies. The HARDI conference […]
Construction has expanded in the U.S. for over 30 quarters, and it still has legs, said Alex Carrick, Chief Economist at ConstructConnect. ConstructConnect presented a webinar May 11, entitled “Bump or Slump? 2017 Prospects for Design & Construction. AIA chief economist Kermit Baker and AGC of America Chief Economist Ken Simonson joined Carrick in discussing […]
Steel Market Update (SMU) has an active presence on social media. We find LinkedIn in particular an area where we can get our LinkedIn readers involved in a subject prompting questions and responses. In the preamble prior to the posting of an article produced by Steel Market Update entitled “Is Trump Administration the Next Black […]
The following article was provided and first published by ArcelorMittal USA news: After experimenting with aluminum in its luxury models, Audi’s next A8 will switch back to steel. Scheduled for release in 2018, the body structure of the new A8 will be made up of more than 40 percent steel, following the trend of automakers […]
Steel Market Update (SMU) spoke with many trading companies over the past few days about concerns their companies might have with the status of the industry and efforts to stop foreign steel from entering the country. “The trading companies are not the bad guy here,” is what one trading executive said to us late this […]
Robert Lighthizer was confirmed as the new US Trade Representative by an 82-14 vote in the Senate on Thursday. Lighthizer faced some opposition from Republican Senators John McCain (Ariz.) and Ben Sasse (Neb.) who said they would vote against the Trump nominee because of his views concerning NAFTA and his alliance with the Administration’s protectionist […]
As I mentioned in one of the articles in tonight’s edition of SMU, I have been speaking with trade attorney Lewis Leibowitz on a whole host of subjects. We will be working on an article to help our readers better understand the ramifications of the Section 232 review (national security) and what powers the President […]
Last week Steel Market Update completed our early May flat rolled steel market trends analysis. During the process, we asked manufacturing companies and service centers to comment on the status of the service center spot market pricing. We found agreement within both camps that steel distributors have been transitioning from a market where they were […]
Flatbed trucks are generally first choice to move steel products from mills to distribution centers to manufacturing clients. What determines what freights will be for this workhorse of the steel industry? Freight costs are influenced by fuel costs, weather, seasonal demand, historical costs, and load-to-truck ratios. Flatbed rates are particularly vulnerable to weather conditions in […]
The US Gross Domestic Product is the values of goods and services produced by all economic activity. The growth of GDP is a function of the growth in the number of employed people multiplied by the growth of their productivity. Steel consumption is correlated to GDP, therefore to understand the direction of the steel market […]
AIST – NASHVILLE, 9 May 2017 — Roger K. Newport, chief executive officer and board member, AK Steel, was named Steelmaker of the Year at AISTech 2017 — The Iron & Steel Technology Conference and Exposition, managed by The Association for Iron & Steel Technology (AIST). The Steelmaker of the Year Award is presented annually […]
My “final thoughts” is an area of the newsletter where I can provide some of my opinions on a wide range of topics, provide information or updates on our workshops and conference or provide late-breaking tidbits from around the world that come in late in the day and are unable to make it into a […]
Twice per month, Steel Market Update (SMU) conducts a review of how buyers and sellers of flat rolled steel feel about their company’s ability to be successful in the existing market (Current Sentiment) as well as three to six months out (Future Sentiment). Earlier today we crunched the data and found the flat rolled steel […]
The U.S. Department of Commerce recently released Final Census Data for March 2017 foreign steel imports. The month officially came in at 3.4 million net tons. This is a huge month. What is probably worrying the steel mills is the license data for April is indicating there will be another boom month for imports as […]
Flat rolled steel lead times are running essentially flat (same as what we have been reporting over the past few weeks) based on the responses we received from manufacturing companies and service centers this week. Lead time is the amount of time it takes a domestic steel mill to produce a new order if placed […]
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. We now have two […]
In summary, the March CPIP data released on May 1st, yielded mixed results. Private expenditures recorded overall growth with the exception of manufacturing, transportation and religious structures. However, State & Local and Infrastructure spending continued to contract. Data in this report is not seasonally adjusted or corrected for inflation. At SMU we analyze the CPIP […]
The JP Morgan Global Manufacturing PMI dipped slightly to 52.8 in April from 53.0 in March. The PMI has shown expansion (above the 50 no-change mark) for 14 months. Manufacturing conditions slowed in the U.S. but was offset by acceleration in Europe, Japan and the United Kingdom. China expanded at its weakest rate in seven […]
The Commerce Department is seeking input from American businesses on what factors contribute to the trade deficit. Commerce is collecting information to submit to President Trump as an information base for renegotiating trade deals and to deter and punish trade abuse. “Many trade abuses are well known to American companies, but because different Federal agencies […]
The April 2017 ISM Report on Business showed economic activity in the manufacturing sector expanding for the eighth consecutive month. The PMI registered 54.8, dropping 2.4 points from March as new orders slowed. The PMI has averaged 56.4 since the beginning of the year. New orders decreased 7 points to 57.5 percent. New export orders […]
The domestic steel mills did not cancel scrap orders for April delivery that had not yet arrived. This is a sign that the steel mills believe prices will be sideways to slightly higher for May delivery than what they negotiated for April. All is quiet as the steel mills and their scrap suppliers jockey for […]
For a number of weeks now (?) Steel Market Update has had our Price Momentum Indicator pointing toward Neutral as opposed to Higher or Lower. Over the past couple of weeks flat rolled prices have been coming off their highs and yet SMU continues to keep our Price Momentum Indicator at Neutral. What gives? Why […]
I have received a number of comments on the LinkedIn posts that I have put out there over the weekend. I shared our “Black Swan” article on my personal LinkedIn account as well as our Steel Market Update LinkedIn group account. I also received a question about the “average margin for a service center” that […]
The Tenth District joins the Dallas and Richmond Federal Reserves in reporting slower manufacturing activity in the region. The Federal Reserve Bank of Kansas City in its April Manufacturing Survey reported its month-over-month composite index was 7 in April, after readings of 20 in March and 14 in February. Most of the indexes that make […]
Is the newly initiated Section 232 the Black Swan event that will remove steel supply from the market and tip the balance of supply/demand in favor of the domestic steel mills, thus pushing prices to levels not seen since 2008? There should not be any doubt that the make-up of the Trump Administration, coupled with […]
Durable goods orders rose to a lower rate in March than expected. New orders rose 0.7 percent to $238.7 billion, well under the Bloomberg forecast of 1.3 percent. Orders for core capital goods (non-military capital goods minus aircraft that are used in GDP calculation) rose 0.2 percent, less than the 0.5 percent predicted. Automotive vehicles […]
Produced by: Congressional Research Service (CRS) Report & Analysis On April 20, 2017, President Trump issued a Presidential Memorandum (“Memorandum”) directing the Secretary of Commerce (“Secretary”) to prioritize investigating the effects of steel imports on national security pursuant to Section 232(b) of the Trade Expansion Act of 1962. Under the Act, if the Secretary determines […]
The industry is abuzz with all kinds of speculation as to how the Section 232 investigation will impact traders and steel buyers. Another Section 232 was announced and should have been signed by President Trump today covering aluminum. I was texting with one of the steel mills this morning about their access to aluminum for […]
This week the Trump administration initiated an investigation on the impact of steel imports on national security under Section 232 of the Trade Expansion Act of 1962. Section 232 has been initiated 26 times within the last 55 years but only two (1979 and 1983) found a threat to national security, both involving crude oil. […]