The Chicago chapter of the Association of Women in the Metal Industries (AWMI) hosted its January event featuring a market outlook presentation from Ping Liang, the Market Intelligence Manager at Nucor. Liang discussed Nucor’s 2025 steel market outlook, highlighting both the strength of the U.S. economy in years past and a forecast of what is to come.
About AWMI Chicago
AWMI is a vital organization within the metals industry, offering networking and educational opportunities in an inclusive environment. Built on four cornerstones—Network, Grow, Educate, and Mentor—AWMI connects industry professionals, fosters personal and professional development, provides relevant training, and events, and encourages mentorship at all levels. Through conferences, networking events, and industry engagement, AWMI continues to expand its reach and impact across the steel industry and other metals sectors.
Ping holds Master’s degrees in Economics and Finance from Auburn University. Throughout her career, Ping has focused on strengthening market intelligence to support both internal and external customers, fostering stronger connections through relatable and actionable insights.
2025 opened in the shadow of a complex macroeconomic backdrop. Despite the pandemic, the war between Russia and Ukraine, decades-high inflation, conflict in the Middle East and a contentious presidential election in the U.S., the American economy remained “incredibly resilient,” according to Liang. The annual growth rate (GDP) over the past five years maintained a healthy and normal trend, running at 2.8% during 2024. While growth is expected to continue in the new year, the pace appears likely to slow.
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Restrictive Interest Rates Weigh on Manufacturing Sector, Metal Demand
Interest rate pressures will likely continue because of inflation, placing a cap on both demand and growth. Although the pace of inflation moderated, it appeared increasingly sticky by the end of 2024. As a result, Liang expects only one or two 25bps rate cuts during 2025 from the Federal Reserve, which may be delayed until the second half of the year.
Due to their strong influence over the manufacturing sector, elevated interest rates will remain a drag on manufacturing growth and its consumption of industrial metals. Higher interest rates mean money is more difficult and expensive to get, which helps explain the almost two years of contraction in U.S. manufacturing.
Manufacturing Headwinds and Tailwinds of 2025
The overall risk profile for the U.S. economy appears more balanced than what occurred in years past. While interest rates remain elevated, cuts during the second half of 2024 helped ease some of the longstanding pressure that kept market conditions constrained. The labor market also appears resilient, which, if sustained, will continue to support U.S. demand. While structural shortages of skilled labor remain, low unemployment rates suggest ongoing health.
The U.S. continues to lead global growth. Both European and Chinese economic conditions show significant problems. Combined with a projected slowdown in the U.S., weakness in other major economies suggests global growth will also decelerate.
The Trump administration arrived with significant uncertainty. Tariffs were widely expected ahead of his inauguration, but markets lack clarity as to how many will be implemented and how long they will last. While trade barriers weigh on market conditions, anticipated deregulation over the next four years will offer a counterweight. Combined with a healthy labor market and infrastructure efforts put in place under the Biden administration, deregulation will offer support to the U.S. economy.
The Impact of Trump’s Second Act
Liang broke down expectations for Trump 2.0 into four major categories: deregulation, immigration, tariffs, and fiscal policy.
With respect to deregulation efforts, the traditional energy sector will be among the largest beneficiaries, potentially with an emphasis on increased drilling efforts. The shift away from the previous administration’s ambitions is expected to have a strong impact on the overall U.S. energy outlook. Despite strong oppositional rhetoric ahead of Trump’s inauguration, the fate of the Green Deal as it relates to renewables and EVs appears somewhat uncertain as markets wait for more specific policy measures. Meanwhile, the proliferation of AI infrastructure and its energy needs will strengthen U.S. energy demand.
Immigration policy shifts are also expected to have a meaningful economic impact in the coming years. Liang expects deportation and lower overall immigration rates will offer an inflationary pressure in certain sectors. The agricultural, lower manufacturing and construction sectors have benefited from lower labor costs in recent years.
Comprehensive tariffs are expected to cause near-term inflation, specifically for products that the U.S. does not have the capacity to immediately turn around. While Liang did not discuss metal prices in her presentation, MetalMiner analysis showed domestic steel prices and aluminum prices have already witnessed a significant increase as distributors and OEMs rush into the market to rebuild inventories.
Tariffs are often used as a negotiation tactic, which could see some of them unravel. Beyond that, higher material prices will constrain demand conditions, potentially dragging prices back down to their pre-tariff trends in the long term, as occurred following the Section 232 tariffs implemented in 2018.
While all factors will have a significant impact on the U.S. economy, manufacturing, and metal markets in 2025, Liang believes fiscal policy will prove the most influential. Corporate tax deductions and lower tax rates would benefit growth. These policies, especially amid economic weakness elsewhere around the globe, will make the U.S. more attractive for investments from other countries. They will help offset still-elevated interest rates and offer the longest impact for the broader manufacturing sector.
Among the four categories Trump is expected to prioritize, Liang believes tariffs and immigration shifts will be “pro-inflation,” while deregulation and fiscal policy changes will be “pro-growth.” Amid the competing influences and uncertainty regarding policy specifics, it remains difficult to determine how the impacts will compound overall, leaving markets in a “wait and see” mindset.
Steel Industry Demand from Leading End Users
Liang anticipates that new policies and economic conditions will have a varied impact on leading end users of steel as well as the steel industry itself.
- Automotive: The automotive sector shows relative stability, which should it continue, will offer steady support to steel demand. Liang expects the industry to maintain its current average of around 16 million units of sales per year. While she noted this is lower than the roughly 17 million witnessed prior to the pandemic, recent interest rate declines and potentially more to come in 2025 will serve to ease pressures on consumers. Sales are not expected to return to their pre-pandemic norms, but Liang believes the sales will remain steady and “relatively healthy.” Markets await a clear policy outline as it relates to EVs. However, the next four years will expectedly witness a slowdown in the pace of U.S. EV demand growth, which will shift the dynamics of the automotive industry.
- Construction: Construction accounts for a substantial amount of steel demand, making it among the most influential sectors for the steel industry. Residential construction will remain pressured following a roughly three-year decline in housing starts. With mortgage rates staying elevated, absent further rate cuts and construction material prices on the rise, this trend is unlikely to change in the near term. The outlook has worsened over recent months as sticky inflation will mean sticky interest rates. Overall, 2025 is anticipated to see minor, marginal improvements. Nonresidential construction will help offset this. Infrastructure spending and the nearshoring of manufacturing will offer support to steel demand, but Liang believes the overall growth of the U.S. construction sector will remain in growth, albeit at a slower pace from previous years.
- Traditional Energy: U.S. energy demand is anticipated to rise, offering broad support to all or most energy sources. The combined forces of deregulation and a more favorable perspective will benefit traditional energy sources. However, whether this will meaningfully increase pipeline infrastructure, which would support steel demand, remains unclear. U.S. rig count fell considerably over recent years, yet the U.S. continued to reach record oil production levels. This suggests industry efficiency, limiting the need for new infrastructure to support output growth.
- Clean Energy: Data centers and increasing energy demand will continue to offer broad support to all energy sources as the U.S. will need to substantially increase capacity to support it, thus supporting steel and other metal demand. This could see the Trump administration maintain support for clean energy , at least to an extent, despite his previously harsh rhetoric towards former President Biden’s green agenda. If Trump institutes funding cuts, wind energy will likely be the first casualty as the sector’s growth is already constrained due to unprofitability, while the solar sector is still waiting for more details to unfold. The nuclear sector may gain more support amid the clean energy.
- Heavy Equipment: The heavy equipment sector witnessed strong growth post-COVID, which offered strong support for steel demand. By 2023, however, inventory adjustments caused demand from the sector to suffer in the following years. Agricultural equipment remains at risk of retaliatory tariffs, which could offer a significant drag on production levels. Liang believes other heavy equipment production will outperform agriculture, but amid high interest rates, it will still likely see a pullback.
Steel Market Outlook
In her comprehensive and thoughtful market outlook, Liang stressed that much remains uncertain in the year to come. As it already has been roughly one month into President Trump’s return, policy shifts, trade relations and other black swan events could significantly change the outlook.
Imports weighed heavily on domestic steel prices throughout 2024, particularly as the sheet market was flooded with cheaper offshore material. Beyond that, early estimates show a modest year-over-year decline in U.S. steel consumption, which added further drag to bearish steel prices. Currently, 2025 is anticipated to see a modest gain in consumption levels according to the World Steel Association. However, those gains are unlikely to hit the market until H2 and remain contingent upon what happens next.
Upcoming AWMI Events
The AWMI’s Chicago chapter’s next event entitled Pioneers of Steel will occur on March 13th, offering a panel discussion featuring these incredible women in the steel industry, Judy Ferraro (Ferraro & Associates, IN.), Debbie Thiesse (Crossroads Steel Supply), Elizabeth Bilitz (Finkl Steel) and Ashley Kotowski (North Star BlueScope). Moderated by Sarah Moran (Ryerson).
For More information of the Chicago Chapter and upcoming events, please visit: https://www.eventcreate.com/e/awmichicagochapter
