Demo Jobs? Piles of Obsolete Equipment?

[Joe Cummings]

Here's something to think about,

Domestic and foreign issues keep scrap prices low

By John Ambrosia - Trend Analysis - April 20, 2015

Along with April’s mostly sideways markets came another dose of reality for sellers in the ferrous scrap market: Prices are unlikely to rebound strongly anytime soon.“I can’t see an argument for either direction,” one Midwest dealer said. “On the one hand, I don’t see any factors improving sufficiently to drive pricing up. But on the other, I also can’t see any justification for prices to be pushed down anymore. We may be enterting a period of stability, although one where we continue to get hammered due to the low level we’ve been running at.”The two biggest factors continuing to create the suppressed situation are basic supply-and-demand issues – mill capacity utilization rates are low, as is foreign need for ferrous scrap. These two have combined to make a huge divot in 2015 scrap values so far. The weekly U.S. mill production capacity rate continues to be historically low. In early March, for the first time in nearly two-and-a-half years, it fell below 70 percent and has not moved over that mark for eight weeks now. At the same time, exports also remain suppressed. U.S. ferrous scrap exports dropped in February to their second-lowest levels in five years. Ferrous scrap exports totaled 984,739 tonnes, down 5.5 percent from more than 1.04 million tonnes in January and 17.8 percent below nearly 1.2 million tonnes shipped abroad in February 2014, the latest U.S. Commerce Department data show.

Export declines continue to affect scrap market

By Bill Beck - Trend Analysis - March 23, 2015

Ferrous scrap exports – specifically the lack of them – continue to have an impact on the North American scrap market.In January, ferrous scrap exports were an anemic 1 million tonnes, the lowest total since last January and on track for a 12-million-tonne year.In 2014, the U.S. exported 15.3 million tonnes of ferrous scrap, the lowest annual tonnage since the down years of 2008-2009. Since topping out at a record 24 million tonnes in 2011, exports have dropped an average of 3 million tonnes a year. For 2015, that means 9 million tonnes that had flowed overseas in 2011 are now searching for a home in the U.S. market. At a time when demand at U.S. mills is drying up, that additional 9 million tonnes is a further drag on domestic ferrous scrap prices. The solution to the malaise that is affecting U.S. scrap exports is a weakened U.S. dollar. But that's unlikely to happen anytime soon. With the Chinese economy showing signs of a dramatic slowdown, and the European Union struggling to jumpstart the EuroZone economy, the U.S. dollar is likely to remain strong for some time to come. And that means millions of tonnes of ferrous scrap that would have gone to make steel overseas will remain in this country.

So when the seller says you can get some scrap guy to haul it away for free,,,,think again LMAO