Educate Yourself - Steel Production... An Update

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Steel Production... An Update
Brian Trumbore
President/Editor, StocksandNews.com

From time to time, some of you write me and say, "Hey, editor, we know you follow steel production, what are the figures telling us these days?"

Well, I don't know if they tell us anything right now, but I had to spend the time looking at the trends since we have all been told that the economic recovery is for real. Glancing at the figures, I have my doubts.

True, steel is but one indicator, albeit a good one in gauging the health of the manufacturing sector (shipping and rail freight traffic are a few of the other good ones), though admittedly the service sector carries more of an impact these days. Nonetheless, it can be a useful gauge and worth looking at from time to time.

So what I've done here is lay out a few periods of time and added the S&P 500 for your information. Following are some guidelines.

--The # represents "thousand tons" produced in a week. The actual # is not as important as the trend. For example, the figure for 2/1/02 is exactly the same as 3/23/90, when I started jotting these figures down on scrap paper. [*Sorry, the data is not on disc, but I'd be happy to supply you with a few individual figures for a given point in time.]

--You may see a 'dupe' or two, which isn't a typo, just a reflection of the way Barron's may have updated or revised the figures.

--One or two of the S&P 500 figures does not match up exactly with the date due to holidays.

I'll return to more normal stories next week.

2002 Steel S&P 500

2/1 1873 1122

2/8 1917 1096

2/15 1902 1104

2/22 1874 1089

3/1 1894 1131

3/8 1881 1164

3/15 1866 1166

3/22 1927 1148

3/29 1989 1147

4/5 1885 1122

4/12 1908 1111

4/19 1916 1125

4/26 1874 1076

5/3 1887 1073

2001 Steel S&P 500

2/2 1849 1349

2/9 1852 1314

2/16 1894 1301

2/23 1899 1245

3/2 1953 1234

3/9 1989 1233

3/16 2009 1150

3/23 2011 1139

3/30 2040 1160

4/6 1968 1128

4/13 1919 1183

4/20 1926 1242

4/27 1871 1253

5/4 1973 1266

2000 Steel S&P 500

2/4 2197 1424

2/11 2194 1387

2/18 2272 1346

2/25 2317 1333

3/3 2299 1409

3/10 2284 1395

3/17 2270 1464

3/24 2290 1527*

3/31 2329 1498

4/7 2379 1516

4/14 2337 1356

4/21 2320 1434

4/28 2320 1452

5/5 2282 1432

*All-time high for S&P

1999 Steel S&P 500

2/5 2002 1239

2/12 1959 1230

2/19 1930 1239

2/26 1973 1238

3/5 2024 1275

3/12 2044 1294

3/19 1943 1299

3/26 1992 1282

4/2 1972 1293

4/9 2051 1348

4/16 1960 1319

4/23 1875 1356

4/30 1961 1335

5/7 1956 1345

And then I thought I'd explore the fourth quarter data (my definition of such).

2001 Steel S&P 500

10/5 1748 1071

10/12 1742 1091

10/19 1707 1073

10/26 1666 1104

11/2 1537 1087

11/9 1625 1120

11/16 1668 1150

11/23 1573 1282

11/30 1576 1139

12/7 1538 1158

12/14 1501 1123

12/21 1370 1144

...production obviously shot up from here.

2000 Steel S&P 500

10/6 2129 1408

10/13 2027 1374

10/20 2042 1396

10/27 1974 1379

11/3 1942 1426

11/10 1972 1365

11/17 1983 1362

11/24 1868 1341

12/1 1874 1315

12/8 1874 1369

12/15 1903 1312

12/22 1759 1305

1999 Steel S&P 500

10/8 2065 1336

10/15 2024 1247

10/22 2101 1301

10/29 2090 1366

11/5 2111 1370

11/12 2064 1396

11/19 2172 1472

11/26 2128 1416

12/3 2206 1433

12/10 2089 1417

12/17 2101 1421

12/24 2168 1458

1998 Steel S&P 500

10/9 1969 984

10/16 1893 1056

10/23 2011 1070

10/30 1986 1098

11/6 1920 1141

11/13 1841 1125

11/20 1864 1163

11/27 1892 1192

12/4 1736 1176

12/11 1747 1166

12/18 1881 1188

12/25 1924 1226

Brian Trumbore

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