Steel Products
March 13, 2013
Final Thoughts
Written by John Packard
Our SMU Price Momentum Indicator continues to be at Neutral and has been for 14 weeks. We do not yet see enough momentum to cause prices to rise or fall quickly. The market appears to be in a slightly over-supplied basis and demand – at the moment – is flat. Not dead by any means, but many service centers are noting that some customers are doing OK while others appear to be struggling a bit.
Inventories appear to be balanced to slightly higher than needed. Our survey from last week found both service centers and manufacturing companies as reporting their buying patterns as “maintaining” existing inventory levels (manufacturers = 72 percent, service centers = 62 percent) or reducing inventories (manufacturers = 25 percent, service centers = 33 percent). These results are consistent with what we found during the middle of February. We do not believe there will be any rush by either service centers or manufacturing companies to book out orders.
