Nerds of Steel

Severstal North America’s Q1 2008 financial results have been added to the Nerds of Steel earnings spreadsheet. SNA had EBITDA per ton of $171 in Q1 2008 up from $39 in Q1 2007. However, this result includes a $156 million gain from the buyout of a long term electricity supply contract. Without the one-off gain, EBITDA per ton was ($6). The Q1 2008 results also include SeverCorr, which shipped over 300,000 tons in the most recent quarter.

Licenses for long products imports into the US increased from 257,000 short tons in March to 462,000 short tons in April, reaching their highest levels since July 2007. Rebar licenses increased from 77,000 tons in March to 189,000 tons in April, mainly due to Turkey, which didn’t apply for any licenses in March but applied for about 95,000 tons in April. Wire rod licenses increased from 78,000 tons in March to 159,000 tons in April; about 35,000 tons due to an increase in licenses from Turkey and the remainder from other countries such as Germany and Brazil. The spreadsheet below will be updated with March actuals as soon as they are available.

Today US Steel reported first quarter 2008 financial results. EBITDA per ton was $62, which is up from Q4 2007 but down from the 2007 average of $78. There were some special charges (inventory adjustments and a litigation reserve) which reduced reported operating income and EBITDA. Excluding these charges, EBITDA was $71 per ton, which is still below US Steel’s peers. To see how US Steel’s results compare to its peers, check out the Nerds of Steel Earnings spreadsheet.
A transcript of US Steel’s first quarter earnings conference call can be found here.

AK Steel announced earnings today. EBITDA per ton was $142 in Q1, which beat AK’s 2007 average of $129. The company guided towards higher margins in Q2, with operating income per ton expected to hit a record level of $125. This implies Q2 EBITDA per ton close to $160. Check out AK’s results along with those of its steel industry peers on the Nerds of Steel earnings spreadsheet.

Today, Steel Dynamics announced first quarter earnings. EBITDA was $191 per ton, well above the 2007 average of $135. You can see the results and compare them to Steel Dynamic’s industry peers by checking out the Nerds of Steel earnings spreadsheet.

This year’s results include the EBITDA generated by STLD’s recent acquisition, Omnisource. We decided to include the Omnisource results in the calculation of EBITDA per ton of steel shipments to keep SDI’s results comparable to Nucor’s. Nucor doesn’t break out earnings by segment, at least not yet. So their cash flow from operations (EBITDA) includes the results from the recent acquisition of David J. Joseph, although I don’t believe the impact to Nucor was significant in the first quarter.