SMU Price Ranges & Indices: Prices Up Before AM Announcement

Steel Market Update (SMU) spend the last 24 hours researching the flat rolled steel markets in an effort to come to a resolution on what the price spread is on hot rolled, cold rolled, galvanized and Galvalume steels. We found about 90-95 percent of the buyers reporting the domestic steel mills as “firm” in their pricing with most offers being referenced as being $540-$580 on hot rolled and $740-$780 on cold rolled with a little higher top end on coated products. As one large service center coined it, “They aren’t at the ‘full Monty’ yet” but they are getting close. The ArcelorMittal flat rolled price increase announcement came in after most of our steel buyers had reported their offers and buys to us earlier this morning and afternoon.

We do expect prices to move higher from here and our Price Momentum Indicator continues to point toward higher spot prices over the next 30 to 60 days.