Premium subscribers to Steel Market Update receive reports on imports with macro data broken down by product at the national level. SMU also provides reports that detail the import tonnage received by district of entry and source nation, available here on our website. This new report from SMU takes the analysis even further. Using U.S. […]
U.S. service centers shipped 38.779 million tons of steel products in 2017, an increase of 3.8 percent compared with full-year 2016, according to the Metals Service Center Institute’s December Metals Activity Report. Shipments of carbon flat roll and plate saw single-digit increases over the prior year, while shipments of pipe and tube products saw a […]
Steel shipments by Canadian service centers in December totaled 280,100 net tons, down 29.8 percent from the previous month, and down 3.4 percent from December 2016, reports the Metals Service Center Institute (MSCI). On a daily basis, total shipments were 14,700 tons per day in December (a 20-day month), down from 19,000 tons per day […]
The U.S. Department of Commerce released import license data earlier today, which indicates that January steel imports are trending slightly higher than December’s 2,475,249 tons. Right now, based on the first 16 days of data, January is trending toward a 2.5 million to 2.7 million net ton month. Semi-finished imports (slabs/billets), which are purchased by […]
The January import licenses are catching what one domestic mill callls, “Taiwanese January onslaught on Galvalume” as it trends toward 100,000+ net tons for the month (from less than 40,000 tons in December). This is what the mill had to say about pricing in general: “We keep moving our HR and CR up. Coated is […]
Over the past six months, Steel Market Update has been canvassing flat rolled steel service centers as we try to better understand the number of months of supply being held as of the end of each month. Steel distributors now hold three months (3.03 month’s supply) based on the responses we have received from our […]
Steel plate prices are rising as demand tightens and lead times lengthen. On Thursday of this past week, Steel Market Update published an article containing comments from steel buyers in both flat rolled and plate steel products. One comment sparked a discussion between one of the domestic steel mills and SMU (and indirectly with the […]
Flat rolled steel prices moved higher this past week, according to the steel price indexes followed by Steel Market Update. It’s a combination of moving into the New Year and getting the holidays behind us, stronger demand on many products and the steel mills moving to collect some, if not all, of the recent flat […]
As expected, Wilbur Ross and the U.S. Department of Commerce submitted the Section 232 report on steel on Thursday evening. The much-anticipated report, originally “due” back in June 2017 (at President Trump’s request), beat the technical timeline by a couple of days. The White House did not release the recommendations reported and does not have […]
Imports of rolled steel into the United States have been on the decline since peaking in July, based on a three-month moving average of government import data through the end of 2017. In three months through December compared to three months through September, total rolled steel imports declined by 16.8 percent, while sheet products dropped […]
In Q1 2018, long product imports increased by 9.5 percent compared to Q4 2017. Total long product imports were down by 150,000 tons per month year over year on a three-month moving average (3MMA) basis, but there was a turn for the worse in the first quarter, according to Steel Market Update’s analysis of federal […]
In Q1 2018, tubular product imports increased by 3.8 percent compared to Q4 2017. Total rolled steel imports increased by 3.6 percent, and tubular products by 3.8 percent, in the three months through March compared to three months through December 2017, but on a year-over-year basis tubulars were up by 20.2 percent, according to Steel […]
This analysis breaks down the imported tonnage of six flat rolled products into the district of entry and the source country. We believe that misinformation (or lack of) about regional import volumes is often used to influence purchase decisions. Our intent with this analysis is to describe in detail what is going on in a […]
As we collected hot rolled, cold rolled, galvanized, Galvalume and plate prices earlier this week, we asked a number of questions trying to get reactions from the steel buyers. We asked how high steel prices could go (using hot rolled as the benchmark) and what were the key drivers affecting prices right now. Here are […]
A handful of carbon steel plate mills have followed Nucor’s lead and announced price increases of $50 per ton today, effective immediately on all new or unconfirmed orders. All extras will remain unchanged. Evraz North America increased transactional prices on all carbon, HSLA, Hot Rolled Coil, Normalized, and all Quenched & Tempered products including Armor […]
A handful of carbon steel plate mills have followed Nucor’s lead and announced price increases of $50 per ton today, effective immediately on all new or unconfirmed orders. All extras will remain unchanged. Evraz North America increased transactional prices on all carbon, HSLA, Hot Rolled Coil, Normalized, and all Quenched & Tempered products including Armor […]
The January buy period saw ferrous scrap prices move significantly higher, lending support to recent mill price increases. While February is historically a down month for scrap, sources predict that February prices will be as high or even higher than January’s. January ferrous markets ended higher by $30 per gross ton for obsolete grades and […]
We have had companies contact us already regarding when registration will open for the 2018 SMU Steel Summit Conference. We will be working on the Steel Summit section of the website tomorrow (Wednesday) with the hope to open up registration for the Aug. 27-29, 2018, event on Friday of this week. We will also open […]
The Nucor Plate Group has increased transaction prices on all new orders for carbon, alloy and heat-treated plate by $50 per ton, effective immediately on any new or unconfirmed orders. Nucor’s Jan. 5 price hike follows on a $50 per ton increase announced Dec. 6 and a $40 per ton increase announced Nov. 15 on […]
During the middle of this past week, a number of the domestic mills, led by Nucor in the east and California Steel in the west, raised flat rolled steel prices. With steel buyers just returning from the extended Christmas and New Years holidays, we found price offers were up, but the actual placement of orders […]
As of late Friday, Steel Market Update ferrous scrap sources reported that scrap negotiations were ongoing and had not yet settled for the month of January. We heard late in the week of one Detroit-area mill paying up $20 per gross ton on prime grades and up $30 per gross ton on cut grades. We […]
Six months ago, Steel Market Update began collecting inventory data from a select group of flat rolled and plate steel service centers. Over time, the number of participating distributors has grown and we have been able to expedite the gathering of information from most (not all) of the service centers involved. Our initial goal is […]
So far this month, Steel Market Update has had a strong response rate from the service centers registered as inventories data providers. As of this afternoon, we had 79 percent of the steel service center data providers respond to our inquiry about their flat rolled and plate steel inventories. The headline number is flat rolled […]
Flat rolled steel prices barely budged over the past couple of weeks as steel buyers and sellers took a break for the Holidays culminating in the calendar flipping over to 2018. When we asked one commercial manager of a steel mill to comment about pricing earlier today we were told, “Gotta let the market percolate […]
After treading water through the Christmas and New Year Holidays, and then pushed by the most recent price increase announcements (+$40 on flat rolled and +$50 on plate), we are seeing steel prices moving higher by an average of $10 to $20 per ton. The expectation by most steel buyers (not all) is for higher […]
Flat rolled steel prices moved higher over the past week. Hot rolled offers are reaching (or exceeding) $700 per ton, while cold rolled and coated offers are moving into the low to mid $800s (base pricing, before extras). Steel buyers seemed resigned to paying higher numbers with many waiting to see what will happen with […]
The fire at AK Steel helped some buyers to accept the price levels being suggested by the domestic mills. Steel Market Update heard from a number of sources that offer prices were in many cases close to the levels suggested by ArcelorMittal USA in their most recent price announcement: $720 per ton hot rolled ($36.00/cwt) […]
It was an unusually busy year for steel trade actions in the United States in 2017. January brought the nominations of Robert Lighthizer as U.S. Trade Representative and Wilbur Ross as Commerce Secretary. During his confirmation hearings, Ross said, “I’m not anti-trade, I’m pro-trade. But I’m pro-sensible trade. Not pro-trade that is to the disadvantage […]
The week prior to the Christmas holiday, Steel Market Update conducted a review of the flat rolled steel market and the trends impacting supply, demand and pricing trends. The steel survey, sent to 640 individuals involved in the flat rolled and plate industries, found service centers as more supportive of higher spot prices than they […]
Flat rolled steel prices were essentially unchanged last week (week ending Dec. 29, 2017) due to the Christmas and New Year’s Holidays. The only exception being SteelBenchmarker, which only produces their indices twice per month with last week being one of those weeks. Hot rolled spot prices are hovering at, or near, $640 per ton […]