Hot-rolled steel prices in the US continue to fall

Hot rolled coil (HRC) and cold rolled coil (CRC) prices continue to decline in the US, losing ground after a sharp rise in late 2023 and January 2024, Kallanish reports.

Currently, prices for hot rolled coil in the United States are in the range of $800-900 per short ton compared to $900-920/t last week. According to sources, the decline in quotations will continue, and the market does not look promising at the moment. Perhaps the outlook will be clearer in March, when automotive contracts with steel mills will be revised.

A source from one of the US mills notes that buyers are market-driven and expect hot-rolled coil prices to reach the bottom of the cycle in the next two weeks. After that, prices are likely to go up again. Currently, buyers are leaning on their inventories to try to buy cheaper material at the end of the first quarter.

Cold-rolled coil prices in the US are declining more slowly than HRC prices. This week, CRC transactions ranged from $1150-1200 per short tonne, compared to $1250-1260 per tonne last week.

Earlier this year, hot rolled coil futures and physical market prices exceeded $1100 per short tonne. The steel mills were optimistic and consistently raised prices for these products and extended lead times. However, they later fell sharply, which came as a surprise to market participants and observers.

As GMK Center reported earlier, according to the CEOs of US steel companies, last year the demand for steel in the US was stable and this trend should continue in 2024. At the same time, 62% of respondents to the World Steel Dynamics survey conducted on LinkedIn expect hot rolled coil prices in the United States to be less than $1,000 per short tonne by the end of the first quarter of this year.