Nucor and Steel Dynamics announced Q3 2012 earnings last week. Links to the companies’ press releases can be found below.
Both companies posted results that were similar to the first two quarters of this year. As you can see on the Nerds of Steel earnings spreadsheet, Steel Dynamics had EBITDA per ton of $79 in the quarter while Nucor reported $66 per ton. We’ll post more results as they are released.
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After a downward revision in April this year, worldsteel made a further revision downward for world apparent steel use in 2012. The revision this time was from 3.6% in April 2012’s Short Range Outlook to 2.1% in the latest October 2012 version published last week. In addition, the forecast for growth in world apparent steel use in 2013 was also revised from 4.5% to 3.2%. That means that instead of ASU of 1,422MT in 2012 and 1,486MT in 2013, worldsteel is now forecasting 1,409MT in 2012 and 1,455MT in 2013 or 13MT and 31MT lower respectively.
wordsteel’s current estimate is that China’s apparent steel use will grow by 2.5% in 2012 instead of by 3.6%, and by 3.2% in 2013 instead of by 4.5%. In fact, worldsteel estimates of steel use in almost every region of the world were revised downward in both 2012 and 2013. Revisions were particularly sharp in the European Union, where steel use in 2012 is estimated to decline now by 5.6% or about 9MT in 2012 instead of by 1.2% or 2MT. Steel use in the EU is now expected to be lower in 2013 (at 148.1MT) than in 2011. The only region where growth is expected to be higher than previously forecast is NAFTA. Steel use in 2012 is expected to rise by 7.5% (9MT) compared to the April Short Range Outlook estimate of 5.2%.
See the spreadsheet below for a better look at the numbers published in the October Short Range Outlook together with regional apparent steel use over the last few years.
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Based on reported import licenses, US flat products imports rose 6% from 695,000 short tons in August to 739,000 tons in September. September flat products imports in 2011 were 576,000 tons, in 2010 563,000 tons, in 2009 434,000 tons, and in 2008 816,000 tons.
A rise in hot rolled imports drove the overall climb, with Korea, Germany, India, and Japan showing the highest increases. Imports of all other flat products categories decreased with cut plate declining the most, by almost 40,000 tons or 30% compared to August, due to lower imports from countries such as Turkey and Brazil.
I will update the spreadsheet below after licenses are updated on Tuesday, October 16th in order to show mid-October licenses data.
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China crude steel production was 58.7 million tonnes in August, 0.08% lower than in the same month last year and the lowest production level since February 2012. Year-to-date Chinese crude production was 476.6 million tonnes, 1.2% higher than year-to-August 2011 output.
Comparing consecutive months, August’s production was 3.0 million tonnes lower than July’s. In addition, China’s net exports in August were 3.04 million tonnes, 0.12 million tonnes lower than net exports in July.
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Worldsteel published August’s global crude steel production on September 20th. World crude steel production was 123.7 million tonnes, -0.3% lower than in August 2011 for the 62 countries reporting. Average daily production declined by 3.9% from July. China’s production remained basically flat at 58.70 million tonnes this year compared to 58.75 million tonnes in August 2011, but with a decline of close to 5% from July this year. Countries which showed a decline of over 200,000 tonnes between August 2011 and August 2012 include the Ukraine, Germany, and Italy, in contrast to Japan, Turkey, and India where production increased more than 200,000 tonnes.
As usual, all the data for August 2012 (and for a number of prior years) is generously shared in the Nerds spreadsheet below.
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