Final Thoughts

During one of the breaks from the FMA/ASD/Tolling Processing meetings I am attending in New Orleans, I met with the head of commercial for one of the domestic steel mills. We had an interesting conversation about the negativity in the market not being backed up by actions. He was telling me that a number of his customers are afraid of prices moving lower while at the same time they are telling him that they have record sales/shipments. He was of the opinion that many of his customers are short steel and could have some issues come May, June and July.

When I asked him about their pricing position after the increase announcements having been made by a few steel mills, I was told they were waiting for their sales people to return from a couple of conferences where they normally get indications of what to expect from their contract business. If the orders come back as strong as expected they will be aggressive with their spot pricing. However, over the next few days they may chose to sit and wait.