Steel players trying to construct an optimistic '12 outlook

Mar 31, 2012 | 07:00 PM | AMM staff

Tags  2012 steel outlook, Michael H. Hoffman, domestic steel industry, Vicente Wright, transportation bill,

While signs of optimism started to emerge several weeks into 2012 among players in the metals sector, especially the carbon steel industry, a few of them are still pointing to potential detours on the road to a fuller economic recovery.

“As much as I’d like to give a totally optimistic preview, I find it difficult to do that under the circumstances and I think we are going to face a somewhat difficult scenario for 2012,” Michael H. Hoffman, vice chairman of Klöckner USA Holdings, said at the Metals Service Center Institute (MSCI) Carbon Products Conference in February.

While most players in the domestic steel industry “are feeling a little better” about the first half of 2012, the overall outlook for the steel sector this year remains less than robust, Hoffman said. “We’re still going to probably languish at around 105 million to 110 million tons of consumption in the United States this year, so that’s not a good outlook.

Service centers collectively have got to set their horizons around the reality of where we are.”....