Lumber futures have dropped 12% this month, falling from a three-year high as U.S. buyers front-loaded purchases before import duties on Canadian wood more than doubled.
Contracts for September delivery closed near $610 per thousand board feet on Friday, declining in nine of the past ten sessions. Canadian mills now face combined antidumping and countervailing duties exceeding 35% under a long-running trade dispute. Random Lengths reported that while producers raised prices to reflect the new rates, buyers were unwilling to pay more.
Jordan Rizzuto, chief investment officer at GammaRoad Capital Partners, told WSJ that the price drop points to slowing demand in U.S. construction and could signal weakness in broader cyclical sectors.
