Raleigh Metal Recycling
Metal Commodities and Recycling Report
March 25th, 2015
2310 Garner Road
Raleigh, NC, 27610
Due to technical
difficulties, we are not able to post a video of the Monday report. See below for the Transcript
This is the Monday Commodities
and Recycling report, brought to you by BENLEE the industry leader in roll off
trailers and open top scrap trailers, as well as Raleigh and Goldsboro Metal
Recycling, the leaders in North Carolina for Scrap Metal, Cardboard,
Electronics and Junk Cars.
Today is Monday, March 23th,
2015. My name is Greg Brown, President
and CEO of the companies.
It was a busy week in the Commodities
and Recycling industry.
As a highlight on the
negative side, Steel Dynamics which owns OmniSource the nation’s second largest
recycler of metals, issued a profit warning to Wall Street, meaning profits
were going to be lower than all had been expecting. The flood of finished goods coming into the
United States and the lowering of volume and pricing of scrap metal were the stated
reasons. It was stated that they would
lose money this quarter (Jan/Feb/March) in Recycling. Nucor Steel, the second largest steel
production company in the United States and the largest recycler also issued a
profit warning. They gave the same two
reasons as Steel Dynamics. Nucor wrote
that their recycling operations would have declining profits, but did not say
if there was going to be a loss.
On the positive side, copper
rose about 10 cents on Friday and has held this price today. As we have stated here, the U.S. Dollar being
strong is one of the reasons copper has declined in price. On Friday, the dollar was a bit weaker, which
was one of the reasons for copper to now be at about a two month high.
 |
| Copper Prices - CME Group |
Aluminum prices after months
of declines seem to be steadying, yet some items such as UBSs (beverage cans)
are still in decline.
 |
| Aluminum Prices - American Metal Markets |
Steel prices held their own
this week. As for next month, some are
saying that we have hit the bottom, but that is not clear. We remain at a multi-year low in steel prices.
 |
| Steel Prices - American Metal Markets |
On the positive side of
steel prices, after weeks of declining steel production, there was a slight
increase last week in U.S. steel production.
 |
| Steel Production - American Iron and Steel Institute |
Oil prices remain a major
factor in recycling with both positive and negative effects. Oil hit an 6 year low this past week, which
means gas price around the world remain low, which will help fuel consumer
demand in the coming months. This means people could buy more cars, trucks and
houses, which would help metal prices. On
the negative side, the oil and gas drilling industry continues to be hurt,
which means they are buying less steel for their drilling rigs and therefore layoffs
at steel mills will continue. The U.S.
oil rig count is now at 866 rigs, compared to 1,473 last year, down an
incredible 44 percent.
There were no changes in our
scrap metal prices last week in North Carolina, with our Raleigh prices of #1
copper being $2.20 per pound, but we see that prices may go up this week. Prepared Steel is still being purchased for
$6.25 per hundred pounds.
With that we hope all
have a Safe and Profitable week. Tune
in next week for the Monday Commodity and Recycling report.
