RALEIGH METAL RECYCLING
METAL COMMODITIES AND RECYCLING REPORT
2310 GARNER ROAD
RALEIGH, NC 27610
This is the 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, Goldsboro Metal Recycling, the leaders in North Carolina for Scrap Metal, Cardboard, Electronics and Junk Cars.
Today is Monday August 10th, 2015. My name is Greg Brown, President and CEO of the companies.
Sadly the story remains the same. There is mostly bad news in the commodities and recycling markets, with only limited positives.
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| Steel Production |
While steel production in the U.S. remains on its slow upward trend, production is well below the level of the last two years.
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| Oil Rig Count |
Two of the things that are helping steel production is that the oil rig count is up slightly, despite falling oil prices and car production is strong.
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| Steel Prices |
With the U.S. dollar remaining strong, the story has not changed in that metal prices remain low. When the attached chart is updated next week, it will show a drop of about $30/GT, making it the lowest price in over 6 years.
Related, the utilization rate at steel mills in the U.S. is now about 74%, yet it was 79% a year ago. The flood of scrap metal into the U.S. from Europe, the manufacturing of low cost DRI, along with low steel production, remain the key reasons steel prices continue to fall.
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| Copper |
Copper hit an important milestone last week. Copper’s all time high was $4.66 a pound in April 2011. Last week, it went below $2.33, meaning it is now trading at less than half its high of 2011. Most believe that copper could go as low as $2.10 or lower, before is stabilizes.
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| Aluminum |
Aluminum also hit a 6 plus year low in the past week. The slow economy and over production of aluminum in China, is a key factor in low aluminum prices.
The U.S. economy continues its slow improvement. There was a good jobs report last week that had over 200,000 jobs created in July. Car and truck sales may hit the highest level since 2001 and the oil price decline will help spending around the world, but none of it is enough to help commodity prices.
On a bad note, Federal Charges were brought against a major recycler in North Carolina this past week, due to banking issues. We are aware of yet another North Carolina recycler that is also currently involved with at least one lawsuit that could lead to charges as well. Recycling is an important industry and markets are worse than bad, but all laws must be respected and followed. Integrity is key to all we do.
For current prices, please call us at 919-828-5426 in Raleigh, 919-731-5600 in Goldsboro.
With that we hope all have a Safe and Profitable week. Tune in next week for the Commodity and Recycling report.
