The wide flange beam (WFB) market has been doing exceptionally well this past year, and buyers have no reason to doubt its strength will continue into the near future. As the non-residential and industrial
construction market remains robust, WFB demand continues to maintain its strength. The slow holiday season and cold winter months did not affect the beam market as it did some other steel products; domestic WFB mills have managed to stay pretty busy during this typically slow time and are continuing to shift products. Supply has been a bit more plentiful for light
beams lately, though there is still strong demand for larger sizes. In some parts of the country, buyers are still experiencing controlled order entry from mills for larger-sized
beams. As announced in December,
Nucor kept WFB prices stable for January shipments. For the first time in a several months,
scrap prices started to inch up in December, causing
Nucor to increase its January RMS by $10 /nt. However, it made a corresponding downward adjustment to base prices, keeping net transaction prices stable. Now that
scrap prices have risen again, there is a good possibility that
Nucor may increase WFB prices for February shipments. Not only have shredded
scrap prices gone up a significant amount in the last few weeks; the beam market is definitely strong enough to accept a price increase. For now, domestic prices for standard sized wide flange
beams (ASTM A992, W10 x 10, W18 x 6, W24 x 7) still range from $33.25 cwt. to $33.50 cwt. ($733 /mt to $739 /mt or $665 /nt to $670 /nt) FOB mill. Although WFB imports are still very rare, import prices have gone down some in order to compete with the domestic market. Prices from
Taiwan and
China are now a couple of dollars lower than domestic beam prices.
Taiwan is shipping to the West Coast with offers at $33.00 cwt. to $34.00 cwt. ($728 /mt to $750 /mt or $660 /nt to $680 /nt) FOB ex-dock West Coast. Chinese offers to Houston are now in the range of $31.00 cwt. to $32.00 cwt. ($683 /mt to $705 /mt or $620 /nt to $640 /nt) FOB ex-dock Gulf Coast.
China is also shipping to the West Coast for an additional $0.50 cwt. ($11 /mt or $10 /nt). In other import news, last week the
US Department of Commerce (DOC) announced the final results of its administrative review of the antidumping order against structural steel
beams from
Korea. The review covers two Korean producers and exporters, INI Steel Company and Dongkuk Steel Mill Co., Ltd., during the period August 1, 2004 through July 31, 2005. The DOC has calculated final weighted-average dumping margins of 1.91 percent for INI Steel Company and 0.00 percent for Dongkuk Steel Mill Co., Inc. The DOC is sending instructions to the
US Customs and Border Protection to liquidate the affected entries which were made during the review period. Census data from the United States Import Administration shows that for the four-month span, September through December, the top five exporters of H sections to the
US were:
Taiwan at 60,088 mt,
Luxembourg at 19,836 mt,
Korea at 16,407 mt,
China at 5,253 mt,
Russia at 3,822 mt, and
Mexico at 3,650 mt.