Lumber malaise
Not a lot of joy in Lumberville these days. The Chinese market is definitely slower, which is the main factor in the oversupply of Canadian lumber...and bad weather in much of North America hasn't helped. It now appears BC mills will pay a 5% export tax on shipments to the US , beginning April 1. There is the possibility of a 10 % tax if prices keep slipping. There will be a "spring buy" at some point, but don't expect prices to move back up much. And then we have the lovely, fractured WEF: mills up, mills down. Some timbers here, some rig matting there, and a whole bunch of cheap green hem-fir dimension heading to those sharpies in the Northeast US. GLTA