Shipments Of Aluminum From North American Service Centers Down In March

Connecting the Dots monitors all major economic announcements in the United States and Canada, but the Metals Service Center Institute (MSCI) also offers industrial metals industry-specific data products that provide much deeper analysis and insight. Visit MSCI’s website and click on industry data to learn more about our Metals Activity Report (MAR), Momentum Monitors, and Macroeconomic Current.

Meanwhile, here are the major economic headlines from the last week:

• According to MSCI’s MAR, U.S. service center steel shipments increased 0.2 percent from March 2024 to March 2025 while shipments of aluminum products fell 6.1 percent. Canadian service center steel shipments were down 16.8 percent year-over-year and shipments of aluminum products declined 12.8 percent.
• U.S. Industrial production fell 0.3 percent from February 2025 to March 2025, but rose at an annual rate of 5.5 percent in the first quarter. The March decline was led by a 5.8 percent drop in the index for utilities. The readings for manufacturing and mining grew 0.3 percent and 0.6 percent, respectively, however. At 103.9 percent of its 2017 average, total industrial production in March was 1.3 percent above its level from one year before.
• Regional manufacturing surveys released last week showed major weakness in the sector. The Federal Reserve Bank of New York’s manufacturing reading for future general business conditions fell 20 points to -7.4 and has declined 44 points over the past three months. New orders and shipments remained below zero at -8.8 and -2.9, respectively, while inventories kept expanding. Read the full report at this link. Meanwhile, the Federal Reserve Bank of Philadelphia said its index for current general activity dropped 39 points to -26.4 in April, its lowest reading since April 2023. Nearly 39 percent of the firms surveyed reported decreases in general activity this month. The index for new orders also fell sharply, from 8.7 in March to -34.2 in April, its lowest reading since April 2020, and the reading for shipments also was down. Read that report at this link.
• U.S. business inventories rose 0.2 percent in February following up a 0.3 percent increase the previous month. U.S. manufacturing inventories inched up by 0.1 percent from the previous month and 0.9 percent from February 2024. Manufacturing sales increased 0.7 percent in February and 2.6 percent over the past year. Total business sales jumped 1.2 percent from the previous month and 3.6 percent from February 2024. The total business inventory-to-sales ratio fell to 1.35, down from 1.36 in January.
• The number of people who applied for U.S. unemployment benefits for the first time ever was 215,000 during the week that ended April 12, a number that was down by 9,000 from the week before. Averaged over the past four weeks, the number of first-time claims fell to 220,750, a decrease of 2,500 from the previous week’s average. In all, nearly 1.885 million people claimed federal unemployment benefits during the week that ended April 5. That figure was up by 41,000 from the week before.
• In other economic news: the number of new homes under construction in the United States fell 11.9 percent between February 2025 and March 2025, but still managed to increase 1.9 percent between March 2024 and March 2025; U.S. import prices decreased 0.1 percent in March while prices for U.S. exports were unchanged; and Canada’s consumer price index increased 0.3 percent from February to March and 2.3 percent year-over-year.