Final Thoughts

The US Department of Commerce provided the domestic steel industry a “win” according to early reaction to the just released preliminary determination of antidumping (AD) against China, Brazil, Japan, Russia, India, Korea and the United Kingdom. I have to imagine some will be surprised at the high penalties assigned to a number of countries (see article on the subject in this issue for complete details). One of the mills involved told SMU this evening that the ruling was “bad news” for their company. When asked if their mill would stop shipping cold rolled to the United States we were told, “Yes, it’s over.”

A warning to our readers, scrap prices are not going sideways in March. They are going higher. There appears to be support coming from Asia and Turkey as international prices are rising. We are also seeing support in Asia in the iron ore spot markets which just went above $50/dmt on 62% Fe fines for the first time in a number of months. Higher scrap prices, especially if they reach as high as $20 per ton will provide a reason for higher flat rolled prices. You should anticipate higher spot prices.