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Market information
Figure 3: Oil Price development in 2019 Source: Nasda
The second OCTG market is rep- resented by oil and gas pipe- lines. The pipeline market is a project-based business with long planning periods and high politi- cal determinations. Such projects are planned e.g. in Europe, USA and Asia. In Europe gas pipelines are mainly built to serve gas from gas and oil elds in Russia.
All these projects are intensively discussed on political and environ- mental platforms. The European project “Nord Stream 2” is a good example, since the US president Mr. Trump and the Polish govern- ment are using all their in uence to ban this project. The US gov- ernment is even trying to thread the involved international com- panies with trade sanctions (see also ITA tube Journal 2019/2). Therefore, also this market can be considered as dif cult in regards of reliable forecasts.
Since January 2018 the tube and
pipe prices increased, re ected by the tube and pipe price index raising by ab. 23 % from 288 to 365 in August 2018. Since then the tube and pipe producer index weakened again to 340 as of Sep- tember 2019 (Figure 4).
Anyhow it must be considered that most tube and pipe produc- ers are facing relatively low plant utilisation at levels of about 62 % for welded tubes and pipes smaller 16-inch diameter as well as seam- less tubes and pipes. For welded pipes larger 16-inch diameter the utilisation is even lower on a level of about 35 %. Here we certainly nd regional variations, but the overall utilisation is still quite alarming.
The US economy is already growing for an impressive time span of about 10 years. When Mr. Trump became US president, in January 2017, he has taken numerous political measures
Figure 4: Producer Price Index. Source: FRED US Bureau of Labor Statistics
ITAtube Journal No3/October 2019