AK Steel Holding Corporation ( AKS ) has announced that members of United Steelworkers Local 1865 have ratified a new 42-month labor agreement effective after the expiration of the existing agreement on Mar 1, 2015. The agreement covers more than 800 hourly production and maintenance employees at the company's Ashland Works in Kentucky. The new agreement will expire on Sep 1, 2018.
Recently, AK Steel completed the reline of the hearth at its Ashland Works blast furnace. The blast furnace has also been put back into full production. The resumption of operation at Ashland Works followed a roughly four weeks of planned outage for maintenance work. The outage, though previously planned for 2015 took place earlier to address certain operational issues.
The outage started in late Oct 2014 and was completed in 27 days, ahead of the company's forecast of 28 days. The blast furnace is now operating at its full production capacity that is considerably higher than pre-outage levels. AK Steel has also completed other routine maintenance works on the blast furnace.
AK Steel is expected to benefit from strength in the automotive market and higher shipment of steel products to automakers. In addition, the acquisition of the Severstal Dearborn plant is expected to boost the company's future earnings and improve its credit profile and liquidity.
However, AK Steel is exposed to weak steel industry fundamentals. Oversupplies in the industry and pricing pressure remain overhangs.
Source: Naddaq
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