SMU Data and Models
October 15, 2019
Service Center Spot at Capitulation (Again)
Written by John Packard
Steel Market Update has to admit 2019 has been an unusual year as we have seen two “dead cat bounces” already and we may be about to live through a third in the coming weeks. Why do we believe flat rolled prices are about to reverse course? Because of the data we have been gathering regarding service center spot prices and what history tells us when we get data at the levels seen this past week.
Seventy-three percent of the manufacturing companies responding to our questionnaire last week reported their service center suppliers as lowering spot prices below levels seen just a couple weeks before. This is the same level as reported in early October.
