Spot market prices for US domestic cold rolled coil (CRC) continue to be heard in the range of $38-$40 cwt. ($838-$882/mt $760-$800/nt), ex-mill, although sources close to SteelOrbis have expressed concern that additional domestic capacity, which is expected to come online in the upcoming years, “could cause additional pricing problems in the future.”
“A lot of us hoped that the Section 232 tariff would reduce import tons and increase domestic demand which would, in theory, keep prices up,” a source said.
Current CRC prices, however, are $6 cwt. ($132/mt or $120/nt) below where they were trending on the day Section 232 tariffs were announced—and this is despite a sharp year-over-year decline in import tons. May 14 data from the US Department of Commerce shows that for the month of March, the US imported 118,510 mt (census data) of cold rolled coil from global sources; in contrast, the US imported 196,575 mt in March 2018.
“People are going to be cautious with their inventories and with their buying until they’re confident the market has bottomed,” another source added, stating reports that US Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin has said that the US may be nearing a deal with Canada and Mexico to lift the Section 232 tariffs, which has thrown additional uncertainty into the mix.