Steel Strip

It appears that most European steel producers have followed the lead of Corus in announcing price increases.
Although UK based Corus were the first to announce increases demand remains subdued domestically although MEPS report an increase in orders in Germany and an improvement in economic activity in Italy and Poland.
Although the general level of increase [...]

Following the general statement made by the Corus Strip Division on 30 January 2006, Corus Strip Products UK will increase its second quarter 2006 prices in the UK by 5-7%, which translates into at least £20/mt for hot-rolled and cold-rolled material and at least £25/mt for coated material, with effect from 2 April 2006.
A spokesperson [...]

Steel giant Corus is to close one of its mills, with the loss of 155 jobs, it was announced today.
The company said it could not rule out compulsory redundancies at the Brinsworth plant in Rotherham, South Yorkshire.
Steelworkers’ union Community said it would meet Corus in a bid to avoid compulsory lay-offs.
General secretary Michael Leahy said: [...]

In January Material Handling Management sat down with the American Iron and Steel Institute (AISI, Washington, D.C.) and the top executives from five steel companies in the Penton Media offices to discuss the most critical issues facing the industry. A report of the meeting, which makes interesting reading can be found at Material Management Handling [...]

World’s Widest Continuous Caster Successfully Commissioned in China
SMS Demag, Germany, have successfully commissioned the singlestrand continuous caster for ultra-wide medium slabs at Anyang Iron & Steel Company, PR China.
The continuous caster will produce ultra-wide medium slabs between 1,600 and 3,250 mm at a thickness of 150 mm, thereby boosting Anyang’s production capacity by around 1.1 [...]

ThyssennKrupp reported a 23% fall in first quarter profits. The main reasons were quoted as falling steel prices generally and in the stainless market specifically.ThyssenKrupp have been selling of some of the lower added value production assets (mainly “long products”)Nevertheless they expect to make pretax profits of around 1.5 billion euros for the full fiscal [...]

Continued growth and increased production requirements have resulted in Island Steel expanding into a new £1.5m facility adjacent to the existing site at Alexandra Docks, Newport, supported by funding from Barclays.
The 36,000 sq ft premises will house a new £1.5m slitting machine, more than doubling existing capacity and will create the highest specification slitting line [...]

So Arcelor have made known a clause in a contract with Nippon that allows the Japanese steel company to withdraw the right to use patent technologies if the ownership of the company changes substantially.
I assume that they hope that this will make them less attractive as a potential take-over target. In fact Nippon is known [...]

The latest MEPS are still forecasting price falls in the second half of 1996 as a result of Asian imports. This is most likely to be felt in the commercial strip sector. In addition the mini mills are likely to be put under immediate pressure as “more savvy” customers note the fall in scrap surcharges.

Prices can be expected to increase slightly due mainly to the stronger dollar, and some minor production curbing in China. Demand is forecast to be poor outside of China itself though. Maintaining prices will depend upon supply remaining under control. A “free for all” could lead to similar price collapses that were experienced in 2005.
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