A reminder to our readers – Steel Market Update will not publish a Sunday evening issue due to this weekend being a national holiday here in the United States (Memorial Day). We will publish as normal on Tuesday, June 1. Inventories are a key component when it comes to understanding the squeeze we have with […]
Price, Price, Price… I might as well begin where I left off in our last issue of Steel Market Update on Thursday. Everyone wants to know when this market will peak, then tip over, and how far it will then fall. There are a wide range of opinions within the steel community, from prices will […]
SSAB Americas reported lower shipments of 480,000 metric tons in the first quarter of 2021 despite strong demand for heavy plate in North America. Due to weather issues in February and lower slab inventories at the beginning of the quarter, shipments fell 16% from the previous quarter and 9% compared to Q1 2020. Higher steel […]
We understand at least one integrated steelmaker is approaching their spot customers with hot rolled base prices of $1,500 to $1,520 per ton. We are not aware of any buyers at this “suggested” HRC price level (it wasn’t that long ago that $1,300 was the “suggested” steel price). We concluded one of our SMU Flat […]
Commented one steel buyer: “No spot supply + strong demand + record-low service center inventories = higher prices. It’s simple economics.” True to that equation, flat rolled steel prices continued their weekly ascent, rising by another $30-35 per ton, according to Steel Market Update’s latest check of the market. The benchmark price for hot rolled […]
By CRU Prices Analyst Estelle Tran, from CRU’s Global Steel Trade Service The strength and longevity of the current uptrend in steel prices has surprised many market participants, and mill maintenance outages are expected to keep lead times extended. The latest lead time survey on March 15-17 from Steel Market Update, which is part of […]
Flat Rolled = 42.7 Shipping Days of Supply Plate = 46.6 Shipping Days of Supply Flat Rolled Flat rolled inventories at service centers edged up in February, largely because of lower shipments caused by harsh winter weather. Flat rolled inventories represented 42.7 shipping days of supply or 2.14 months of supply at the end of […]
Service centers reported lower shipments during the month of February partially due to the harsh winter weather associated with “Snowmageddon.” Steel Market Update’s proprietary service center inventories and shipments report indicated 42.7 days of flat rolled inventories, which is up from 40 days of supply on hand at the end of January. Plate inventories stood […]
Service centers reported lower shipments during the month of February partially due to the harsh winter weather associated with “Snowmageddon.” Steel Market Update’s proprietary service center inventories and shipments report indicated 42.7 days of flat rolled inventories, which is up from 40 days of supply on hand at the end of January. Plate inventories stood […]
Good news for NLMK USA customers as the mill has worked out a tentative agreement with the union at their Farrell, Pa., facility, which will end the strike that goes back to late August. Once back in production, this will help (slightly) with some of the supply issues we have been seeing in the market. […]
Flat Rolled = 40 Shipping Days of Supply Plate = 46.5 Shipping Days of Supply Flat Rolled End-of-January service center flat rolled steel inventories fell back to levels seen in November 2020. At the end of January, service centers carried 40 shipping days of supply – tied with November for the lowest inventory level in […]
Some of you may have noticed that we have adjusted our language when it comes to the SMU Price Momentum Indicator. At this moment, the momentum indicators for hot rolled, cold rolled, galvanized, Galvalume and plate steels are pointing toward higher prices over the near term (next 30 to possibly as far out as 60 […]
Steel Market Update released the final detailed report on service center inventories and shipments to our data providers on Friday. It will be released to our Premium level members tomorrow. I mentioned in Thursday’s Final Thoughts that watching this data is one of the keys to figuring out when the market may get to a […]
Swedish steelmaker SSAB navigated a difficult year in 2020, taking down production and idling blast furnaces due to lower demand and COVID-19 restrictions. “Looking back at it, I think our flexibility in the system has served us well because when the market started to recover in Q4, we were quite fast to adapt to that […]
Wholesalers who sell galvanized steel products to the construction and HVAC markets are skeptical of analysts’ predictions of a big price correction in the next few months. Judging by the persistently strong inquiries from their customers, most believe the experts underestimated steel demand as prices were on the way up and may do the same […]
On Wednesday at noon the Biden administration will take over the Executive Branch of the U.S. government. President Biden is planning on hitting the ground running as he works to control the pandemic, put the U.S. back in the Paris Climate Accord, and (unfortunately) deal with a country fractured by Trump insurrectionists. Biden has made […]
I anticipate next week’s spot hot rolled and other flat rolled steel prices will be higher than what we reported on Tuesday evening (HRC = $1,080 per ton average). We received information from an end user today of hot rolled purchases of $1,140 per ton for end of March/early April production. An order for HR […]
By CRU Prices Analyst Estelle Tran, from CRU’s Global Steel Trade Service U.S. steel service center inventories continue to remain low in terms of material in stock, as many buyers reported that they cannot secure all the sheet steel they require. Steel Market Update, which is owned by CRU, reported service centers carried 51.3 shipping […]
As we enter the New Year (goodbye 2020, welcome 2021), you will notice changes to Steel Market Update. One of the very first things you will notice is that our newsletters will have more relevant content in them. This is due to the addition of Michael Cowden who joins us after spending 13 years with […]
John Packard, President & CEO of Steel Market Update discusses changes being made at the company, events on the books for 2021, and the status of the flat rolled and plate steel markets – including steel price commentary: As we enter the New Year (goodbye 2020, welcome 2021), you will notice changes to Steel Market […]
Let’s play “fun facts.” Last week Steel Market Update published our average hot rolled spot price as $885 per ton ($44.25/cwt). With the domestic steel mills asking $900-$960 per ton for new orders of spot (if they are offering at all, which is a separate issue all by itself) SMU expects HRC spot prices to […]
Let’s play “fun facts.” Last week Steel Market Update published our average hot rolled steel spot price as $885 per ton ($44.25/cwt). With the domestic steel mills asking $900-$960 per ton for new orders of spot (if they are offering at all, which is a separate issue all by itself) SMU expects HRC spot prices […]
Yesterday (Wednesday, Dec. 2) we hosted one of our SMU Community Chat Webinars. The guest speaker was Josh Spoores, Principal Analyst and editor of the Sheet Monitor for CRU. I thought it was one of the best presentations and discussions we have ever had at one of our webinars. You can see a recording and […]
The Perfect Storm: Long lead times, late deliveries, low service center inventories, strong demand, higher prices, lack of foreign steel imports, mill outages both planned and unplanned, maximum capacity utilization rates at a number of mills, NLMK USA strike, higher ferrous scrap prices that are expected to go much higher in the coming months, restrictions […]
The SMU Steel Price Momentum Indicators on all flat rolled and plate steel products are currently pointing toward higher prices over the next 30 days. We expect hot rolled, cold rolled, galvanized, Galvalume and steel plate pricing to increase during the coming weeks. The two major reasons for our position are the limitations of supply […]
Hot rolled steel prices just keep rising. Steel Market Update puts the current benchmark price for HR at $685 per ton. How much higher can it go before correcting? Opinions vary widely. Responses to Steel Market Update’s market trends questionnaire this week indicate that a solid majority (62 percent) of industry executives believe the HR […]
The following article on the hot rolled coil (HRC) steel and financial futures markets was written by Jack Marshall of Crunch Risk LLC. Here is how Jack saw trading over the past week: Hot Rolled The latest hot roll production data shows that recent year-on-year figures are off by roughly 20 percent due mainly to […]
Steel Dynamics’ CEO Mark Millett was upbeat on the prospects for steel demand in the fourth quarter and beyond. “You can clearly see what is happening in the marketplace through one’s order book—ours is in pretty good shape,” said Millett. Flat rolled demand and momentum remain strong, inventories are at historical lows, imports continue to […]
Steel Market Update’s service center inventories data for September shows supplies on hand at very low levels. At the same time, the percentage of inventory on order is at very high levels. That suggests, say some observers, that some service centers may have waited too long to replenish their inventories, then did some panic buying […]
Flat Rolled = 45 Shipping Days of Supply Plate = 51.3 Shipping Days of Supply Flat Rolled Service center flat roll inventories fell significantly month on month as shipments increased and mill lead times extended. The SMU service center inventories data for September shows that service centers carried 45 shipping days of supply of flat […]