Fladude, you are right, the market in metals and commodities is wildly different now from a US viewpoint. Producers used to write contracts for iron ore with the Japanese in USD as hedges against our AUD or the Yen falling, and very stable it was for a long time - by definition it was therefore stable for US consumers. Now that the USD has eased against everyone else, and world demand in general rising, metal prices have gone through the roof in USD terms - and its going to the Chinese mills. Energy costs are huge too, the more the metal is refined the more of that steel price is not iron but coal!

Thanks for the correction. It is quite a change for us to feel that prices are going up both here AND there. But after seeing how the US economy shrugged off the rust belt's 1980s under-response to Japan, I am sure that US human energy will adjust and overcome, short, medium or long-term.

I still fancy a Wilbur Smith novel about international trade in double-gun derivatives though...