The American Iron and Steel Institute (AISI) reported Wednesday that based on the US Commerce Department's most recent Steel Import Monitoring and Analysis (SIMA) data, steel import permit applications for June totaled 2,734,000 net tons (nt). This was a 3 percent decline from May permit tons, but a 2 percent increase from the May preliminary import total of 2,692,000 nt.
Import permits for finished steel products led the increase, jumping 15 percent to 2,109,000 nt in June from preliminary imports of 1,838,000 nt in May. The estimated finished steel import market share in June was 23 percent, and the year-to-date share increased to 22 percent.
In June, the largest finished steel import permit applications for offshore countries were for Korea (318,000 nt, up 49 percent from May), China (154,000 nt, up 29 percent), Japan (141,000 nt, up 8 percent), Russia (100,000 nt, up 102 percent) and Turkey (94,000 nt, up 36 percent).
A number of finished products registered significant increases in June, including sheet and strip--all other metallic coated (up 90 percent), rebar (up 64 percent), cut length plates (up 40 percent), line pipe (up 24 percent), cold rolled sheets (up 22 percent), oil country goods (up 17 percent) and plates in coils (up 17 percent).