Last week, US domestic flat rolled steel mills announced they’d be raising prices on all flat rolled steel products, including US CRC, by a minimum of $1.25 cwt. ($28/mt or $25/nt), effective with all new orders.
Sources close to SteelOrbis have since confirmed that spot market prices, which were previously heard at $38.50-40.00 cwt. ($849-$882/mt or $770-$800/nt), ex-mill, have firmed by $1.00 cwt. on the bottom end, and by $0.50 cwt. on the top end. This brings the current average spot market price transaction range to $39.50-$40.50 cwt. ($871-$893/mt or $790-$810/nt), ex-mill.
Import CRC prices from Russia in the US domestic market, on the other hand, have revised downward, from $34-$36 cwt. ($750-$794/mt or $680-$720/nt), DDP loaded truck in US Gulf coast ports, to $33-$34 cwt. ($728-$750/mt or $660-$680/nt), DDP loaded truck in US Gulf coast ports.
The wildcard in terms of pricing is the “lack of announcement” in the Section 232 investigation, which at this point, has been delayed until an indeterminate time.
“We’re getting a lot of requests from customers because they think that domestic prices are about to come back down,” a source said. “But it’s probably going to take about a week for this to really shake itself out.”
Others note that due to the lack of offshore ordering activity that took place in the past two months, import arrivals in September and October are expected to trend light, which could help support current US spot market prices.