New Britain herald., 1917-10-18
Steel and Pig
 Iron Markets
The Iron A ra says:

| of the herculean task that the trade ! prophesied is borne out by the few ness of the items covered in the two i agreements so far made. As indicat- 1 ed in The Iron Age last week only
 semi-fnished steel was included in ; the announcement of Oct. Ii. Just when additional maximum figures will
 be settled on is not clear, but it is
 likely, now that ratios have been es-
 tablished for conversion differences ! between raw materials and semi-fin- 1 ished products and between the latter 1 and finished forms, that further gov 1 ernment prices will be arrived at | without requiring general sessions in Washington between the war indus l tries board and the producers. Whatever the basis of the adverse ] criticism already developing, the un- deriving object in the price fixing seems clear-to secure condition
 which will bring out 100 per cent. production. A surprisingly low billet price, $47.50, out of line somewhat, other differences in prices being con- sidered, makes for a wide spread be- tween the steel for, and the steel as finished product. Clearly less con-
 cern is thus shown for the billet pro- ducer, with relatively less margin be- tween pig iron and scrap and the
 billet On the score of accelerating mill operations may be accepted $47.50 billets on the one hand and $58 and $6O for bars and beams on the other and $50 for slabs against $65 for plates.
 The fact that plates are put at $5 and s7 per ton higher than bars and beams is also perhaps recognition of the special cases of recent addi- tional mill capacity entailing high capital charges, with similar incen-
 tive to encourage slab production at $2.50 per ton more than billets. On high authority it is intimated
 that the industry is expeced to ad- just itself to the new base prices, par ticularly in the matter of adopting usual trade practices without specific announcements in this regard. It is | not clear as yet, however. that pro- ducers are expected to take any in itiative in revising prices of major
 commodities not yet covered. Ap- proximations as to what they may be, discounting special conditions, may be ascertained by comparing the new prices with the average of those for the years 1911 to 1914, inclusive, the four-year period before the war de- mand developed. The producers have used quotations of The Iron Age for this interval as the basis of their fig l ures in deliberating with the war in- | dustries board.
 Before the end of the week, the base for wire will probably be fixed. 1 A figure a little above the mean be- l tween the quotation of the largest l maker and the higher one of the oth 1 CTS would harmonize with the rest of
 the new prices. The spectacle of l raising the price acceptable to the l one vanshes when it is recalled that l it has long been made on much de- ! ferred deliveries.
 Old material well as sheets and | tubular goods are also sh ortly to be l settled. AS yet steel rails have been l given little attention. Chicago as a basing pLint bids fair to stay The | contention is that largest buyers in the Middle West have commonly been billed without including the Pitts burgh- Chicago freight rate. Tin 1 plate, which involves the cost of the imported covering material, will prob ably be considered. as desired by producers, by the food administrative board.
 Outside of government orders, busi- ness has been. light. Sales of steel have been made at both the fixed
 prices and higher, the latter, like l. 900 tons of billets at $50, represent
 ing largely the closing of options
 made before the price announcements. The signs are that before long sales will be sufficiently numerous to es- tablish a public market at the agreed figures.
 Government purchases include fully 3O,000 kegs of nails and 5000 tons of
 steel pipe, and 30,700 cars the United States is to put into Russia, are
 about closed. Upward of 100000 tons of structural steel will shortly be bid on for ships.
 The pig iron market has been char acterized by a more general and more
 cheerful acceptance of the agreed
 prices than has prevailed in the fin-
 ished and semi-fnished markets.
 Considerable selling has been made
 on the basis of $33, furnace, for iron
 analyZing 1.75 to 2.25 per cent sili-
 con. The recommendations as to de-
 tails of schedules submitted to Wash
 ington have not yet been acted on
 Sales of basic have included 10000
 tons in the Philadelphia district.
 There is no difficulty in placing iron
 offered for sale, and several makers
 have withdrawn from the market
 Some buyers who bought iron at high
 prices are asking to have their con-
 tracts readjusted, but this has not
 generally been done