Based on the US Department of Commerce’s most recent Steel Import Monitoring and Analysis (SIMA) data, steel import permit applications for the month of January totaled 2,655,107 mt. This was a 7.6 percent increase from the 2,466,635 nt in permits recorded in December and an 8.5 percent increase from the December final imports total of 2,447,814 mt. The estimated finished steel import market share in January was 25 percent.
Finished steel imports with large increases in January permits versus the December final included hot rolled strip (up 89 percent), standard rails (up 45 percent), reinforcing bars (up 43 percent), standard pipe (up 39 percent), cut lengths plates (up 33 percent), sheets and strip all other metallic coatings (up 29 percent), oil country goods (up 15 percent), cold rolled sheets (up 15 percent) and wire rods (up 11 percent).
In January, the largest finished steel import permit applications for offshore countries were for South Korea (295,473 mt, up 21 percent from December final), Turkey (245,526 mt, up 75 percent), Taiwan (118,523 mt, down 11 percent), Japan (152,078 mt, up 10 percent) and Vietnam (91,646 mt, up 77 percent).