Final Thoughts

I did trade emails with trade attorney Lewis Leibowitz regarding the International Trade Commission (ITC) commissioners. I wanted to know if the new president of the United States could make wholesale changes with the commissioners and change the balance of the rulings being made on steel trade cases and others. Mr. Leibowitz told us, “The ITC Commissioners are appointed for 9-year terms by the President with Senate confirmation. No more than three can be from one political party. Unless there is resignation or death, it is unlikely that any single President will appoint a majority of the Commissioners.”

My recommendation to steel buyers is don’t over-react to the latest hot rolled AD/CVD final determination announcement. It will take a few days to a couple of weeks before things will get sorted out and we have a better look at the competitive landscape. We have heard that Turkey and Hyndai (Korea) will continue to ship. Our expectation is Japan will replace Australia at Steelscape (just our opinion, we have no inside information on the subject at this time). USS/POSCO is the big question mark as the 60 percent margins were a huge surprise. We have been asking who can replace the 900,000 to 1,000,000 tons the mill will need. US Steel could step up but they would probably have to reopen Granite City (again our opinion with no inside information). Freight is a huge issue.