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HOTLINE - Watch for career-building tips
- Count on lower prices for lumber in coming months
- Want to reduce costs of conferences and meetings?
- Look into buying energy through trade groups
- Researching market price trends?
- Look out for new round of Nigerian mail scams
- Expect electronic transactions to be put on equal legal level with paper deals in next couple of years
- Don't believe that airline labor strife is over
- If you want to know what to expect in purchasing over the next decade
- Insurance policies won't automatically protect against Year-2000 losses
- Expect imports of steel and commodity chemicals to put downward pressure on pricing for at least the next two quarters, maybe longer
- Japan is country to watch
- Don't be shocked by big rate increases for ocean cargo coming into West Coast ports
- Here's some guidelines for next year's planning:
- Don't miss the 1998 Purchasing Conference
- Look out for tungsten shortage
- Natural-gas prices may not stay low for rest of this year
- At least one high-profile economist has uttered the "D" word. "In my opinion
- Yet another ominous sign for the U.S. manufacturing economy:
- Uncle's import price index fell 0.3% in August
- The Federal Reserve detects trouble spots in the U.S. economy
- Economists are worried about the swelling trade deficit, and with good reason
- Buyers report that low-carbon steel wire rod, Grade 1006 industrial quality, has dropped
- TRANSACTION PRICES
Economy - For 1999, consensus GDP forecast now stands at 2.2% (a one-tenth drop from August)
Markets - The global market for specialty silicas is expected to grow at a rate of roughly 4%
- U.S. gasoline consumption will increase in 1999
- U.S. auto sales totaled 10,448,814 units through August, a 1.2% gain over year-ago
- U.S. demand for railroad wheels, typically at 1.5 million/year, is now expected to total 1.7 million
- U.S. consumption of specialty steel totaled at 1,617,044 tons in first-half 1998
- Coated free-sheet paper is pouring into the U.S.
- Through April of this year, U.S. imports of uncoated free-sheet
- Lumber markets may soon be glutted
- Uncle's Energy Information Administration projects that world oil demand will grow by less than 1 million barrels/day
- U.S. demand for folding cartons has been in a holding pattern this year
- In four years, domestic automobiles will contain an average of 263 lb worth of plastics
- Cincinnati Milacron will sell its machine tool businesses
- The imminent merger of Jefferson Smurfit and Stone Container into Smurfit-Stone Container will result in new U.S. operations
- Motorola, suffering from a steep drop in demand for chips, pagers
- Isuzu and General Motors have formed dmax Ltd.
- Inland Steel of Chicago, the sixth largest steel producer in the U.S., recently acquired a subsidiary
Prices - On average, unleaded gasoline has fallen back to $1.06/gal
- By year end, market pulp prices will drop to their lowest level since 1994
- Market tags for steel reinforcing bar products have come under attack
- London Metal Exchange nickel prices will continue to average around $2/lb
- Chile's central bank expects London Metal Exchange copper to average 75(cent)/lb
- World aluminum ingot prices will remain depressed over the coming year
- One bullish forecaster puts the U.S. aluminum ingot average at 70(cent)/lb next year
- Expect domestic polyvinyl chloride tags to remain weak through 1999
- Prices for personal computers are plunging
- Nucor, the number-two U.S. steelmaker, has cut flat-rolled steel prices for October deliveries
- Because of the sharp drop in prices, nearly one in two U.S. families is expected to own a desktop PC
INSIDE PURCHASING
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Metals Outlook '99
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