With the approaching Christmas holiday and the typical seasonal construction slowdown, buyers are expecting US rebar prices to remain largely flat through year-end.
"Our fabrication division is staying very busy and is not wrapping up by any means, but on the distribution side it's quiet," one Southeast buyer said. Platts maintained its southeastern US rebar price assessment at $470-$500/st ex-works Tuesday.
The Southeast source said he has not received any discount offers from mills on large-volume, year-end orders, but he also has not been chasing them.
"It's been status quo," he said. "We're busy with year-end functions, but we're not expecting anything crazy between now and [the new year]."
One Midwest buyer said he also isn't planning any big buys until the new year.
"I think like a lot of people, we are going to try to ride the rest of the year out and try to match our inventory with our backlog," he said.
Platts maintained its weekly Midwest rebar price assessment at $475-$500/st ex-works on Monday, holding steady for the second week in a row.
While US scrap prices strengthened at the end of last week, a second Southeast buyer said he doesn't see it having an immediate impact on US rebar, given the relatively low demand. Platts raised its daily shredded scrap assessment to $180-$190/lt delivered Midwest mill on Friday, up $10/lt day on day. The scrap assessment was unchanged Tuesday.
"All mills have plenty of available rebar for immediate delivery and remain aggressive to sell," he said.
