Start-up costs at three locations and losses at its new SBQ operation in Cleveland led to the weak first quarter, the company says. The losses at the Cleveland facility were due to poor management of buying billets as well as the intensely competitive market conditions. Selling prices and shipping volume dipped during the quarter, the company says. Canadian mills had healthy earnings and revenues in the first quarter. The market for sheet products remains strong because of continued economic growth, particularly in automobile production, Algoma says.
Demand also is high for energy-related tubular products.
Ipsco has, in hand, firm orders in excess of 40,000 tons of such material for the second and third quarters alone and has been actively bidding on other projects. Earnings drop for most nonferrous producers Aluminum markets improved and copper prices rose from the fourth quarter of 1996 to the first quarter of this year. Fabricated-product prices were weaker than in the first quarter of 1996, but most producers said these prices picked up recently. Compared with the fourth quarter, aluminum orders were up, lead times increased, and finished-product inventories fell, analysts say. The transportation segment, which is 28 percent of the world's aluminum market, is growing at 6-9 percent annually, Prudential Securities says.