Metal Monday June 7, 2021 with Nick Snyder and Brett Ekart.
Play the youtube video and follow along with the text below.
Nick Snyder:
All right. Welcome, everybody. It's Metal Monday, on an actual Monday. I like it.
Brett Ekart:
We're actually in the podcast studio.
Nick Snyder:
All the stars aligned. I open my phone this morning, like I always do, and we had green and red.
Brett Ekart:
Green on the precious metal side, and red on the base metals.
Nick Snyder:
Looked like Christmas lights.
Brett Ekart:
It's better than Friday. Was it Friday?
Brett Ekart:
Thursday.
Brett Ekart:
We opened it up and it looked like god damn been attacked by werewolves. Blood everywhere.
Nick Snyder:
Looked like Halloween. That one was Halloween. Today we got Christmas. Not all the gifts you get on Christmas, or what you want, but we'll take some green.
Brett Ekart:
Dude, I love me a good pair of underwear and some new socks. That's my jam.
Nick Snyder:
You have to wait every year. I try not to buy any until that comes around. Anyway. We didn't know where iron was going to be last week. I think you got a better idea now. What is it doing?
Brett Ekart:
Yeah. I think it's anywhere from 30 to some places you're up 50, 60. It depends on where you're shipping, what you're doing with it.
Nick Snyder:
Seems like closer to 30 on the West Coast.
Brett Ekart:
Over here, we're dealing with some mill issues and some other stuff. Sometimes the stars align, and sometimes they don't for you. So is life. I think, generally speaking, you should be in that 30 to 50 range, depending on where you're located at.
Nick Snyder:
Copper had a pretty rough week. At the end of the day, shoot, it's still close to 450, copper. Little bit below, right now, but we're right there, call it 448.
Brett Ekart:
It feels we're basing out. I feel we're just bumping along that 450 to it's going to make a decision to go lower, significantly, or higher, significantly. It feels like we're just humming along around that 450, up and down a dime. I feel still pretty good about that. Aluminum prices are still decent. I feel stainless prices is the price of iron, ferrous material climbs, as long as the nickel hangs in there, then your stainless prices are going to stay good. We talk about it all the time, optimistic about the short to medium term. I don't think inflation's going anywhere, as far as it's going to hang around. That's always good for commodities.
Nick Snyder:
Is that because it pushes the dollar down?
Brett Ekart:
Yeah.
Nick Snyder:
Part of it?
Brett Ekart:
Push the dollar down and-
Nick Snyder:
Just inflation products, itself.
Brett Ekart:
Honestly, it's a supply driven market, too, right now. Every time I turn around, everybody's out of something. There's a shortage of this. You can't buy that. It's because the logistics and the container market's pretty screwed up. Then you've got just supply shortages of everything. If it's not one thing, it's another. Commodities, base metals, are no different. My big thing that I want people to watch is, and you know I've been calling the price of ferrous to be higher for a while now, I feel I've been on the right side of it. I think the price of iron is going to go significantly higher if the export market turns on, more than it already has. I'm not saying it is going to, for sure, but I'm just saying if you watch that export market and you start seeing that thing push, the price of iron is going up.
Nick Snyder:
It feels like we've been waiting for the switch to get clicked for a long time. It's just been nickel and diming our way up. Like you said, it feels like the market's rate is taking a really big jump for whatever, however long I'll-
Brett Ekart:
I firmly believe that we're going to see big iron prices.
Nick Snyder:
Then, typically the commodities tend to follow each other on the metal side, all of it really. Our electricians that we deal with, I just paid a really big one that does residential, mainly. They're four months out to order Romex for housing. Four months. I asked him why. I'm like, "Why? Why do you think?" He's like, "Big combination of things. How much we're building around this area. Second, the production wasn't really there during COVID." They have lower production levels now, so the warehouses aren't as full. They need to be cranking. It's not that easy once people are allowed to go back to work, or shops decided it's safe to go back to work. You can't just turn a switch. A lot of those employees found somewhere they wanted to work. It's not that easy. We'll see what happens, because we're hearing that with concrete, lumber, all the building.
Brett Ekart:
It's going to be an interesting summer. There is no doubt. I anticipate higher iron prices.
Nick Snyder:
I guess we'll have to wait-
Brett Ekart:
In the next few months.
Nick Snyder:
Maybe June, July?
Brett Ekart:
Mm-hmm (affirmative).
Nick Snyder:
All right.
Brett Ekart:
That's my prediction of the day.
Nick Snyder:
I like it. Thanks, everybody.
Brett Ekart:
All right. Take care.
Brett Ekart:
See ya.