The
US oil rig count may have added an additional 10 rigs last week but the current tally, which has been recorded at 351 for week ending July 8, is still down 294 rigs from the same reporting period last year.
Year-over-year oil exploration in the U.S. is down 45.6 percent.
Sources close to SteelOrbis continue to report that the lagging rig count has both the
US domestic and import OCTG markets trending with depressed activity. “There’s plenty of stuff that’s still on the ground and people just really don’t need to buy right now,” one source said.
Trader sources say that while futures offer prices from Korean and Taiwanese OCTG producers is still trending at approximately $27.50-$29.50 cwt. ($606-$650/mt or $550-$590/nt), DDP loaded truck in
US Gulf Coast ports, that pricing continues to be “hard to pinpoint. Some mills are quoting higher, some are a little lower. It depends on who the buyer is.”
Ex-mill pricing in the domestic market is also “a virtual unknown,” sources say, adding that distribution centers are still brokering on-the-ground material from one another, and that “pretty much no one is asking for mill pricing because there’s still plenty of stock on the ground that’s available immediately.”