Metal Monday December 6, 2021 with Nick Snyder and Brett Ekart.
Play the youtube video and follow along with the text below.
Nick Snyder:
All right, welcome everybody. We are in to December, it is Metal Monday. How are you doing Brett?
Brett Ekart:
I'm good, man. It's holiday season right now, right?
Nick Snyder:
Yup.
Brett Ekart:
It's like every time you turn around there's something going on. I mean, I walked into Tom's office this morning, there was a bunch of good food on the conference table.
Nick Snyder:
Tom's girlfriend made it, and that never happens.
Brett Ekart:
I know. So it's like food bombs everywhere, you know, parties everywhere.
Nick Snyder:
Lot of gatherings, couple short weeks, funky weeks, that make it kind of hard to operate normally.
Brett Ekart:
Uh-huh (affirmative). But it's good, man. It's that time of year and you know it's coming and you get ready for it. Probably the best thing that we did, or at least the thing I'm the most excited about, is we pushed our company dinner, our holiday, to January so we can let everybody get through this time of year. And then we can... Gives us a little bit more time to plan, but also just kind of lets the holiday season kind of set in.
Nick Snyder:
Yeah, I think it'll be good for... Because that's always, we used to do it in December and November. And then you have to, on a personal level, you have to plan into your daily routine around all the family. And then sometimes people couldn't come. So I think it's the first time we've done it in January.
Brett Ekart:
Yeah.
Nick Snyder:
So we'll see how it goes.
Brett Ekart:
It's worth a shot. I mean, if there's one thing about us, if anybody knows, we are not afraid to try something different.
Nick Snyder:
We'll try something new and if it doesn't work, we'll fix it.
Brett Ekart:
Yeah. We'll fix it the next time.
Nick Snyder:
Yep. Well, so any light on ferrous for the month?
Brett Ekart:
You know, it feels like a sideways market. I mean, I was anticipating it to be a little bit stronger. But you know, I guess that's what we do this for is-
Nick Snyder:
Even in the Midwest, I mean all the AMM was talking it up from 50 to 30, depending on the grade, and that came off, right?
Brett Ekart:
Yeah. I mean, I guess that makes an interesting dynamic for January set to happen. But I guess we'll see. I mean, I don't know where this thing's going to go, but it feels like there's still some positive momentum in the market on the ferrous side. How does that translate into 2022? I mean shoot, if we knew that answer, we'd be rich. But we don't, so we're going to just do what everybody else does and kind of see how this thing plays out.
Nick Snyder:
Well, copper's hanging in there. I mean, up a few pennies this morning.
Brett Ekart:
Yeah. 4.31 or something like that it hit, so...
Nick Snyder:
It's not the 4.70 we were seeing, but still 4.31, I mean, I love it. I mean, I'm happy with a 4.30 copper market.
Brett Ekart:
We didn't get to $5 this year yet, but there's still a few trading weeks left, so we'll what transpires.
Nick Snyder:
We'll see what happens when we get a heavy run by the end of the year, but I don't think we see five dollars like we thought.
Brett Ekart:
No, no. But hey, I guess we got a whole nother year. We get a whole nother crack at it.
Nick Snyder:
I mean, it's going to be-
Brett Ekart:
It's going to be better, I think.
Nick Snyder:
Yep. We're almost into the new year and we'll just see how it goes into January, you know? And we'll see everybody on Mondays, but everyone enjoy their holiday season too.
Brett Ekart:
Yeah, exactly. I think it's going to be a good, it'll be a good run. Nickel's staying strong. Aluminum's... You can see it softening up a little bit, but it's still hanging in there. The aluminum prices out there, you know... This is a tricky time of year to price things because so many mills, so many consumers are weary about putting a bunch of inventory on the ground going into the end of the year. Nobody wants to add a bunch of purchases or sales in their books, or sometimes they do. And it's just, every consumer is different in how they play the consumption game at the end of the year. So even for us, it's kind of tricky in how we go about making our sales. So December always just creates that dynamic for whatever reason. So I think that's kind of the internal battles that we fight as far as pricing stuff.
Nick Snyder:
Yep.
Brett Ekart:
And where do we feel our comfort level is?
Nick Snyder:
Because we try to pass that to the customer. So we try find that sweet spot where we're taking care of them, but also keeping the lights on here, you know?
Brett Ekart:
Exactly, exactly. And everybody kind of trying to anticipate what January, 2022 brings and, you know...
Nick Snyder:
It's like betting on sports. I've learned you just could flip a coin.
Brett Ekart:
Half the time, man. Vegas isn't bad at what they do. They don't build them buildings because they're just out there throwing darts at a dart board and seeing where they land, you know?
Nick Snyder:
Yep.
Brett Ekart:
All right. Well, everybody have a great week. We'll be back next Monday and enjoy the holiday season. It's upon us.
Nick Snyder:
Thank you everybody.
Brett Ekart:
All right.