US domestic rebar pricing remains flat following last week’s increase, while wire rod pricing was steady for the fourteenth straight week, market insiders told SteelOrbis.
Insiders said long steel pricing remains flat even as as the outlook for December scrap pricing remains steady to potentially higher on expectations for increased mill purchases next month, they said.
And, while news reports from Washington, DC-based Construction Dive indicate non-residential construction spending fell for a third time in four months, market insiders continue to report that data center builds primarily are behind the continued demand in long steel markets.
“If the data center construction bubble that has formed, pops, the [domestic] rebar market will cool off,” remarked a Midwest-based long steel insider to SteelOrbis.
In the weekly rebar spot markets, domestic supply on an FOB mill basis was assessed with most transactions noted at $46.00-47.00/cwt, ($920-940/nt or $1,014-1,036/mt), on average $46.50/cwt, ($930/nt or $1,025/mt), unchanged from seven days ago.
SteelOrbis market insiders described domestic rebar as going through an “upward pricing cycle”, with continuing anticipation of price increases possible through the end of year and in the first quarter of 2026. Right now, they say, pricing is driven by the availability of the rebar itself.
“There needs to be a $2.00-3.00/cwt., difference between the price of domestic supply and the price of imports to get anything to come into the US, though, right now it’s less about price, and more about supply availability,” the Midwest insider added.
In the domestic wire rod market, domestic supply on an FOB mill basis was assessed with most transactions reported this week at $46.50-47.50/cwt ($930-950/nt or $1,025-1,047/mt), or an average of $47.00/cwt ($940/nt or $1,036/mt), unchanged from seven days ago.
Insiders told SteelOrbis Nucor confirmed its wire rod prices in a customer letter several weeks earlier, keeping wire rod pricing flat at previous price levels.
