September 08, 2008

AISI chairman sees no sign of recession in US as yet

Reuters reported that fears of recession may be exaggerated and despite weakness in some sectors such as auto manufacture, US steelmakers are looking at another strong year.

Mr Ward Timken current chairman of the American Iron and Steel Institute a Washington based industry group said that "I think we run a very real risk of talking ourselves into a recession. Unfortunately, people are taking this subprime stuff and broad brushing the economy and it's dangerous because there are companies that do very well in this kind of environment."

Mr Timken said that “Steel market fundamentals are relatively robust. He added that the question is whether our customers are throttled by access to capital. I have not seen that happen yet; we have not seen a lot of order-book attrition."

He also said that “A lot of steel producers have broadened their customer base so they are less exposed to any particular segment of the marketplace. I think that's what we're seeing right now you're looking at profitability being reported by various companies.