Trucking ahead...and "Steeling" for the Future..

UPS reported that its revenue for 1Q 13.7% lower than least year. Its CEO said that “Economic indicators tell us recovery in the U.S. might begin late this year, but more likely not until 2010. So we expect the second quarter will be another difficult one. As a result, UPS anticipates earnings per diluted share in a range of $0.45 to $0.55."

Another stalwart, Nucor, the largest U.S. steel maker by production, reported its first loss ever as a severe recession sapped demand for the metal. It forecast an even bigger loss for the second quarter, calling conditions the worst it's ever seen.
The comments by its CEO, Mr. Dan DiMicco are quite insightful. "These are the most challenging steel market conditions we have ever seen. It is very unfortunate and extremely frustrating that our country’s misguided economic and political policies over the past two decades have created the current financial crisis.When times get tough the 21,000 plus men and women of Nucor and our David J. Joseph and Harris Steel subsidiaries see opportunities to make our company even better and stronger. As always Nucor’s most significant competitive advantage remains our people. The right people working together as team, the team that takes ownership of driving Nucor’s long term success. This facts experience not only a record of strong profitable growth of more than four decades, but also why we know our best years are still ahead of us. I want to again express my gratitude for the dedication of every member of the Nucor team there at this time of global economic crisis. We realized that this is a time of hardship and difficulty for all of our team mates as older time, the significant loss value for our share holders, but I want to assure you that our work during these adverse economic times will pay big dividends and the inevitable economic recovery arrives. We only have to look back as recently as 2001 to 2003, to see what we achieved during the last economic downturn. Quit simply, we positioned Nucor for the greatest period of book in our history. As always, we are doing it together. Thank you and keep up the good work. Severity of this down turn is unprecedented. Steel production, capacity utilization numbers and the American Iron and Steel Institute tell a story. For this quarter 2009, steel production in the United States declined 53% from the year ago quarter.Industry capacity utilization for the just completed quarter was less than 43%, down from the first quarter of 2008 rate of more than 90%. Nucor is not immune for these conditions and economic crisis unlike anything seen in their life time. Today, we reported the first losing quarter in our history that breaks a record of continues quarterly and annual profitable going back to Nucor’s start in 1966.Warren Buffet said that best last month in his observation that the economy has fallen off a cliff. Now, we have yet to see any evidence that’s abrupt in severe decline in economic activity has reached the bottom. In fact, conditions are continuing to worsen with each successive month so far in 2009. There are few signs of improvement at this time.I wish I was able to write a more encouraging report on current and future second quarter conditions, but as always our team will tell exactly like it is and it is extremely ugly out there. I’ve noted one simple, yet extremely important fact many times over the years in my conversations with investors. Nucor has a business model that even in the good times is based on how the company might have to run things in the bad times.If you wait for an economic crisis to hit to get prepared for it you probably want survive. There never been truer that in today’s economic crisis. A sustained recovery in the economy all depends on while government gets serious and realistic about fixing the deep structure and balances in our huge foreign trade and budget deficits that brought the U.S. economy under world’s economy to this tragic condition.Quite simply, we need significantly more job creation, significantly less debt, significantly lower cost of doing business, not significantly higher cost and a much stronger focused on the top five most important issues facing our country and the world’s future. The economy, the economy, the economy, the economy and the economy extremely certainly presence and our economy suggests that may come down to survival of the fittest in the months and years ahead. (errors are due to a transcription of the conference call).