Steel Products Prices North America

August 29, 2019
CRU Forecasts Downtrend in Demand, Pricing Until 2H 2020
Written by Tim Triplett
Steel demand will continue to weaken into 2020, but will bottom next year and set the stage for an inventory rebuild and rising consumption beginning in the second half, predicted CRU Principal Analyst Josh Spoores in his remarks Monday during Steel Market Update’s Steel Summit in Atlanta.
U.S. industrial production is currently growing at just a 1 percent rate, and the steel-intensive portion of IP is slightly negative. So, CRU forecasts a 0.9 percent decline in steel sheet demand in 2019, and an even worse contraction of 2.2 percent in 2020 before demand rebounds.


