Welcome back, everyone. It’s Metal Tuesday, and it’s looking pretty rough today, almost like a traditional “blood in the water” kind of Metal Monday. Copper isn’t hitting that $4.20 mark. It actually dipped down to around $4.08 earlier today, and we’re sitting at about $4.07 or $4.08 this afternoon. Across the board, it’s been a rough day—copper, platinum group metals (PGMs), oil, aluminum, and nickel all got hit hard. Even the stock market took a beating.

Honestly, today might have been better suited for a Metal Wednesday. Maybe we’ll see some recovery by then, but as of now, it’s not looking good.

For those of you looking for positive news on the ferrous side, sorry to say, it’s not coming this month. You might have to check another podcast for that. I listened to Bulls vs. Bears this morning, which gives a detailed breakdown on iron, but it’s not pretty. The stats look good on paper, but iron is not scoring any points, so it’s tough out there.

So, what’s going on? Why is everything falling? It seems like everyone is cautious, sitting on their heels. Goldman Sachs even lowered their projected price point for copper. They were expecting it to trade above $5, but they’ve now walked that back, largely due to the economic weakness in China. China is a huge consumer of commodities like aluminum and copper, and right now, they’re not buying as much.

I read an article about China dumping steel on the world market, and it’s definitely having an effect. This is also discussed in Bulls vs. Bears. The global economy, and particularly China’s slowdown, is playing a big role here. It’s all speculative—people were betting on the upside before, and now they’re betting on the downside. When the stock market bleeds like this, commodities go with it.

The worrying part is if this bleeding continues all week. Typically, after a bad day like today, we’d hope for some recovery tomorrow, but it’s hard to be optimistic right now. There are those stretches where markets just keep going down, and it feels like we’re in one of those. Everyone is holding onto their scrap, thinking things will get better next month, next week, or tomorrow—but sometimes, the last sale ends up being your best sale. I hope I’m wrong and that things turn around, but right now, it’s rough.

On a positive note, the first full weekend of college football happened, and Notre Dame won! That’s good news for me and my fellow Notre Dame fans. I hope everyone had a good Labor Day weekend with their families, but we came back to some tough markets.

Labor Day always feels like it marks the end of summer, and we kicked off the 75 Hard Challenge on Sunday. It’s been a busy weekend, and the challenge is going well so far. Managing work while juggling the workouts, reading, drinking water, and everything else is tough, but it’s a great test of time management and mental strength more than physical.

Last time I did this, I noticed a real improvement in my time management, and that’s something I hope to carry forward again. Even after the challenge ends, some habits stick—like rucking at night for me. It’s a good way to clear my head and get some extra exercise in. As for the diet part, I mostly stuck with it, though I brought alcohol back in after the challenge. We’ll see what happens after these 75 days!

We’re only on day three of the challenge, so there’s a long way to go, but I mentally break it down by counting the days until I’m in the 60s, then the 50s, and so on. That makes it more manageable for me.

Thanks for tuning in. We’ll be bringing back Football Friday Live this Friday, so stay tuned for that. Have a great week, everyone!