Stainless steel
and nickel alloys market

JACQUET Metals trades in the market of high-value metals for a clientele of industrial companies, primarily stainless steel and nickel alloys.

The Group stores mainly thick plates that are either sold as such or cut according to customer specifications.

The world market for steel products amounts to approximately 1.2 billion tons, of which 2.3%, or 28 million tons, represents stainless steel products.

In the stainless steel market, plates amount to 19 million tons and include:

  • cold rolled plates, with 14.5 million tons produced up to 5 mm thickness, for use in the automobile market, as well as in consumer products industries for applications such as household appliances, crockery, and decoration,
  • hot rolled plates, with 4.5 million tons produced, for industrial use (boiler construction and structural steel work).
    There are two types of thick plates:
    — hot rolled sheet metal (strip, coils),
    — hot rolled sheet metal using a QUARTO type rolling mill. These plates often exceed a thickness of 12 mm and represent approximately 1,000,000 tons, i.e., 3.6% of the total stainless steel market. They thus make up a niche market and represent the core market products of JACQUET Metals. These 1,000,000 tons are generally split equally between project and distribution activities. Factoring in consumption, JACQUET Metals accounts for around 10% of the global distribution market.

Since 1985, the worldwide consumption of stainless steel has increased by an average of 5.5% per year. The consumption of hot rolled stainless steel, a trade segment of JACQUET Metals, increased during the first half of 2008, but demand slackened in the second half, because of the global crisis.

The advantages of stainless steels:

  • anticorrosion and neutrality properties of the product used to process fluids and gas in the following sectors of Industry:
    — chemical, including pharmaceutical and cosmetic,
    — agricultural processing (hygiene constraints and easy maintenance),
    — paper manufacturing,
    — gas processing and storage (cryogenics, technical gas),
    — water treatment (settling tanks for waste water, desalination of sea water, transport and distribution),
    — environment and pollution control (processing of flue gases and waste),
    — energy (hydroelectric plants, nuclear power plants, thermal power stations, etc.),
    — more recently, for use in construction work, especially on bridges.
  • regular reworking of the alloys in order to meet increasing requirements from the various sectors of industry. While only two stainless steel alloys existed in 1960, JACQUET Metals now supplies seventeen varieties, completed over the past few years with an equal number of nickel alloys with anticorrosive properties superior to those of stainless steel.

The JACQUET Metals market covers over a third of industrial applications.

12.35 € / +0.05%