US steel exports of 2.7m tons in the first quarter were down 7% from last year, Kallanish learns. The American Institute for International Steel (AIIS) says this drop is “unsurprising, given that the US dollar is significantly stronger now than it was a year ago”.

“An expensive dollar, combined with stagnant or weak economic activity in much of the world, appears to leave little room for optimism on the part of exporters for the rest of 2015”, says AIIS, which is the only steel-related trade association that supports free trade.

Canada has driven the export decline, with Q1 exports down -17% to 1.3m tons. At the same time, shipments to Mexico have risen 7% to 1.05m tons and exports to the EU have grown 388% to 111,200 tons.

Q1 exports with noticeable year-on-year declines include heavy structurals (-39% to 164,000 tons), coiled plate (-27% to 100,600 tons) and OCTG (-23% to 98,300 tons). Rebar exports (down -31% to 86,800 tons) and line pipe (-60% to 33,700 tons) also fell heavily. At the same time, exports of cold rolled sheet are up 10% to 177,200 tons and exports of all stainless steel products grew 39% to 247,500 tons, according to US government data analysed by Kallanish.