US lumber prices expected to remain high this year

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CBC/Fordaq
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The ascending US housing starts and the tight softwood lumber supply from the Canadian lumber producers is expected to maintain the prices high in 2018.

As CBC News reported, the number of US housing starts beat expectations by surpassing 1.33 million in January on a seasonally adjusted basis, with single family starts increasing 7.6 per cent. Housing permits approached 1.4 million, and Conifex Timber Inc. chairman and CEO Kenneth Shields said that he also expects repair and remodeling markets will remain robust.

"With this favourable demand backdrop coupled with duties on Canadian lumber exports to the U.S., we expect lumber prices to remain strong in 2018," he explained, adding that the company's earnings per share doubled in 2017, posting record revenues that rose 15%.

The demand growth is going to surpass the lumber supply increase for the next 18 to 36 months in the US and so the trends "will be pointing upwards, not down," Shields added, as quoted by CBC.

Prices have been creeping up annually and stood at $528 US per thousand board feet for Western SPF lumber shipped from Canada, up from an average of $278 in 2015 and $401 last year. At these prices, harvest reductions in British Columbia will likely be deferred while production will accelerate, CBC News reported.

Paul Quinn of RBC Capital Markets said the thinking among Canadian producers has changed over the past year. They originally expected to absorb half the duties with the other half being passed on to consumers. What happened was that producers pushed all of the duty to consumers and more.

Quinn added that the lumber prices, which reached a nominal high last year, will abate once a new softwood lumber agreement is negotiated in a year or so after the U.S. government is forced by an administrative review panel to drop the duty rate. Other large western Canadian producers are equally positive about the year.

West Fraser Timber Co. Ltd. CEO Ted Seraphim said North American lumber demand should grow by two billion board feet per year, while US production will only modestly increase by the 750 million to one billion board foot range annually, CBC reported.

In 2017 the volatility over the uncertainty about duties made buyers reluctant to buy lumber, but Seraphim explained that the supply-demand fundamentals are improving.

Also, Don Demens, CEO of Western Forest Products Inc., said record lumber prices largely offset the impact of U.S. duties as lumber revenues fell six per cent last year despite a 13 per cent decline in shipments. The company has reversed plans to cut back on capital investments because of uncertainty in the softwood dispute.

"Our view is there's not very much uncertainty anymore. We know the duties we have and we know the process ahead of us," Demens added.

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