Washington, D.C. – Based on the Commerce Department’s most recent Steel Import Monitoring and Analysis (SIMA) data, the American Iron and Steel Institute (AISI) reported today that steel import permit applications for the month of July totaled 2,289,000 net tons (NT)*. This was a 5.7% decrease from the 2,428,000 permit tons recorded in June and a 6.3% increase from the June final imports total of 2,152,000. Import permit tonnage for finished steel in July was 1,936,000, up 12.9% from the final imports total of 1,715,000 in June. For the first seven months of 2024 (including July SIMA permits and June final imports), total and finished steel imports were 17,629,000 NT and 13,636,000 NT, up 1.4% and 2.6%, respectively, from the same period in 2023. The estimated finished steel import market share in July was 22% and is 23% year-to-date (YTD).
Steel imports with large increases in July permits vs. June final imports include tin plate (up 124%), cut length plates (up 103%), wire rods (up 87%), heavy structural shapes (up 59%) and cold rolled sheets (up 39%). Products with significant year-to-date (YTD) increases vs. the same period in 2023 include sheets and strip all other metallic coated (up 71%), sheets and strip hot dipped galvanized (up 41%), wire rods (36%), cold rolled sheets (up 28%) and structural pipe and tubing (up 18%).
In July, the largest steel import permit applications were for Canada (497,000 NT, down 11% from June final), Brazil (339,000 NT, up 9%), South Korea (199,000 NT, down 5%), Mexico (151,000 NT, down 28%) and Japan (139,000 NT, up 65%). Through the first seven months of 2024, the largest suppliers were Canada (3,930,000 NT, down 6%), Brazil (2,823,000 NT, up 15%) and Mexico (2,089,000 NT, down 20%).
*Note that import permits data are counts of tonnages requested in applications for licenses to import steel products and are not `actual import volumes. For a number of reasons, permit tonnages may understate or overstate actual import volumes for the month, preliminary estimates of which will be available later this month.