Steel prices coming back to normal?

The thing that strikes me most about the current steel market is that $600/ton ($30/cwt) for hot-rolled coil (HRC) sure looks like the “new” $600/ton.

That’s a joke of course. I make it in remembrance of all that talk in 2021 and following the invasion of Ukraine this year about how the new normal for HRC would be higher than the old normal.

I recall predictions that the new normal for HRC would be anywhere from around $800/ton to as high as nearly $1,000/ton. That doesn’t seem likely now, to put it mildly.

Recall we hit a post-war peak of $1,480/ton in late April. We’re now at $655/ton, or nearly 56% lower, according to SMU’s interactive pricing tool.