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US New Home Sales, Home Ownership: June and 2Q 2018
Contracts for new, single-family home sales declined in June, falling -5.3% to a 631,000 seasonally adjusted annual rate according to estimates from the joint release of HUD and the US Census Bureau Wednesday last week. The decline came off a downwardly revised May estimate, which was dropped from an initial read of 689,000 to a new estimate of…
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A Steadier Supply-Demand Balance for Looming August Lumber Market
The supply-demand balance situation became much more clear this month for North American solid wood operators. Also, end-users have updates on field inventories both at producers and with secondary resellers. As the market was better able to determine how much construction framing dimension lumber is in the supply chain compared to immediate future building needs,…
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British Columbia Forestry Worker Strike Vote
About 1,500 sawmill workers impacting 13 sites in northern British Columbia are expected to take a strike vote sometime in the next week or so, said the Williams Lake Tribune Tuesday last week. The move could impact all of Tolko Industries’ employees in the north (including both mills in Williams Lake, BC), half of all…
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Politics Upends the Lumber Market
The unprecedented turned to the frankly surreal last week as Canada placed retaliatory duties on a wide range of US imports, including wood and paper products. The latest trade data, meanwhile, shows quite a glowing picture of product sales across the Canada-US border for 1Q 2018. Current Softwood Lumber Prices Compared to Recent and Historical…
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Canada Sawmill Production: March 2018
Lumber production in Canada rose +11.4% in March from February, to 5,898 thousand cubic metres of lumber, according to the latest update from Statistics Canada Monday. Production was -5.2% lower than in March 2017. Sawmills shipped 5,393 thousand cubic metres of lumber in March, up +10.5% from February and -7.6% lower than in March 2017.
