From the category archives:

Articles

China, Steel & the Growth of Both

December 17, 2008

The difficulties of interpreting and forecasting the current dynamic economic environment are revealed in the latest World Bank report on commodities. You can download the report at the World Bank site or directly from us here Commodities at the Crossroads, 2009. It’s long-winded holiday reading, but if you follow steel (or commodities generally) it’s worth […]

Read the full article →

GDP and steel demand in Europe

November 23, 2008

In response to a presentation I posted recently on this blog, I received the following questions from an investment firm based in Switzerland. 1) Is your indicated correlation also applicable to Europe only, i.e. could it be used to forecast steel demand in Europe? 2) Europe is expected to grow below 2,5% real GDP for […]

Read the full article →

Steel industry capacity utilization falls below 70%

November 5, 2008

Data just released by the AISI shows raw steel capacity utilization at 67.3% during the last week of October, down from close to 90% a couple months ago.  How does utilization below 70% compare to previous recessions?  And how long might it last?  A review of historical data is always a good place to start […]

Read the full article →

6 reasons why a downturn in steel won’t be as bad as in the past

October 15, 2008

The tumult in financial markets will spill over into the ‘real’ economy in a number of ways not least of course in slowing economic growth on regional and global levels. Slower economic growth means less steel consumption and production so it’s worthwhile, if a little sobering, to contemplate just how hard steel might be hit. There have […]

Read the full article →

IMF World GDP Growth Forecast

July 17, 2008

The IMF just released its latest World Economic Outlook. The WEO includes world gdp growth forecasts for 2008 and 2009. Not surprisingly, world growth is expected to decelerate to 4.1% in 2008 and 3.9% in 2009, compared to 5.1% in 2006 and 5.0% in 2007. What does this mean for global steel demand growth? The […]

Read the full article →

Scrap or Pig – Iron is Iron

June 18, 2008

It used to be the case that minimills (scrap buyers) and integrated mills (iron ore buyers) had very different cost structures. Integrated steel producers’ costs were relatively fixed because iron ore and coking coal were sold on an annual contract basis and did not change much year to year. Scrap prices on the other hand, […]

Read the full article →

← Previous Entries

Next Entries →