The cost of nearly everything, including steel, is rising in the United States, yet the value of ferrous scrap—the highest-volume feedstock at most steel mills in America—has remained largely stable in the second quarter of 2026.
Through the first five months of 2026 and into June, the domestic iron and steel in the industry in the U.S.—where roughly 80 percent of American recycled steel is consumed—showed signs of strength and pricing power leverage.
In the week ending June 6, 2026, raw steel production in the U.S. reached 1.877 million tons, with mills operating at an 81.3 percent capability utilization (capacity) rate, according to the Washington-based American Iron and Steel Institute (AISI).
The output figure demonstrated momentum compared both with 2025 production and represented a small gain in output compared with the prior week, says AISI.
One year earlier, American mill production stood at 1.782 million tons, or 5.3 percent lower compared with the first week in June 2026. The early June production figure represented a less dramatic increase compared with the final week in May of this year, but output nonetheless rose 0.3 percent week on week.
The steel being made seems to be finding buyers, and the resulting demand has prompted recycled-content steel producers such as Nucor Corp. and Gerdau to raise the prices they charge for their products, according to media reports.
This week, the Ukraine-based GMK Center website reported North Carolina-based Nucor had “once again raised its spot price for hot-rolled coil (HRC) steel by $10 per short ton compared to the previous week.”
Citing a letter Nucor sends to its customers on a weekly basis, GMK reporter Halina Yermolenko says the June 8 price of $1,115 per ton for HRC meant “Nucor has been raising its spot price for HRC on a weekly basis since Jan. 27, 2026.”
The same GMK article cited fellow business information services provider Kallanish Commodities as having reported that Gerdau Long Steel North America was raising prices for steel beams and other products by as much as $80 per ton in the second week of June.
During the same week, London-based Kallanish characterized the price of ferrous scrap as likely to remain flat during the June domestic mill buying period and bids from Turkey (America’s largest recycled steel buyer) as trending lower.
The stagnant price of recycled steel in America while its mills ramp up production seems like a market anomaly. A recent LinkedIn post by Atilla Widnell of satellite information services firm Navigate Commodities serves to remind processors and traders in America they are part of a wider global market, however.
In early June, Widnell said his firm’s satellite tracking had shown that European blast furnaces and electric arc furnace (EAF) steel mills both had been cutting back output in May, creating “ferrous scrap (over)supply pressure” in that region.
Although the European Union has taken up trade measures to address what the information supplier calls import competition and penetration, an early 2026 flood of imports has combined with high energy costs (“the same phenomena currently hurting Turkish heavy industry,” says Widnell) to cause steel output in the EU to fall in April and May.
“While the seaborne ferrous scrap pricing floor has been set by hot U.S. steel markets through most of 2025 and 2026, the growing European ferrous scrap supply and demand imbalance has recently started acting as a ‘drag’ on the headline U.S. index number,” writes Widnell in his post.
If the supply of recycled steel generated in Europe is surpassing the continent’s ability to consume it, the existence of the new “swing tons” on the global market could offer a partial explanation as to why scrap generators and shippers in the U.S. are not enjoying higher prices.
As measured by domestic mill transaction figures from April 20 to May 19, 2026, gathered for the Raw Material Data Aggregation Service (RMDAS) of Pittsburgh-based MSA Inc., benchmark grades of recycled steel refused to follow the upward pricing trend of finished and semi-finished steel products.
The figures show No. 1 heavy melting steel (HMS) losing $8 per ton in value nationally in the time frame, while No. 2 shredded scrap lost $2 per ton off its price compared with the previous 30 days.
Only the price of the RMDAS prompt industrial composite grade (consisting of No. 1 busheling, No. 1 bundles and No. 1 factory bundles) rose in late April and into May, gaining $4 per ton in value.