Bryzos CEO Says US Steel Market Squeezed by Trump’s ‘Anaconda Plan’ — Will Pain Bring Gain?

Many United States businesses involved in global trade are experiencing a sea of change and a sea change.

The President Donald Trump administration doubled down on tariffs with its reinstated Section 232 measures, slapping 25% duties on steel imports and eliminating country exemptions while introducing stringent “melted and poured” requirements to qualify for duty-free status. The metals industry is bracing for impact.

“Trump is getting serious about this,” Shep Hickey, CEO at metal digital marketplace Bryzos, told PYMNTS Karen Webster. “He’s trying to level set trade imbalances and get the domestic engine of manufacturing really running at a higher RPM.”

“What he’s doing is a kind of ‘anaconda plan,’” Hickey said. “He’s closing off all possible entrances.”

The broader implication is that importers are out of escape routes. In the first iteration of the steel tariffs during Trump’s initial term, importers found ways around the duties by bringing in unfinished goods or routing shipments through countries like Canada.

“It was a bit of a charade… They were straw countries,” Hickey said. “Businesses could import as an unfinished good, finish it elsewhere, and sidestep the tariffs. Now you can’t really do that because everybody has a tariff.”

Still, even as the administration pushes for domestic revitalization, the U.S. does not have the capacity to meet its steel demand.

Price Pressures and Margin Compression

The supply shortage has already triggered price hikes, not just because mills are charging more, but also because distributors are thinking about replacement costs. That calculus has a ripple effect.

“We’re seeing prices go up,” Hickey said. “Businesses are trying to conserve stock, and the easiest way to do that is raise prices or just stop selling.”

“It’s not what you paid for your inventory — it’s what it’ll cost you to replace it. That’s what’s driving the decision making now,” he added, noting that “some portion of marketplace users were buying inordinate amounts of metal” to hedge against price hikes.

The political goal of the tariffs is ultimately to revitalize U.S. manufacturing and reduce dependency on foreign steel. But the real-world implications may remain far murkier, and there is no fast fix in sight, he said.

For the final seller in the supply chain, the squeeze is acute.

“During Trump 1.0, the tariffs mostly compressed profit for whoever was last in the chain,” Hickey said. “They quoted a price, they’re locked into it, and now their costs are going up, but the buyer doesn’t want to hear that.”

“You can’t just water the lawn and have a steel mill pop out of the ground,” he said. “All that takes time. And it’s not just build time, it’s permitting time. Sometimes the permitting takes longer than the build.”

Navigating Toward Homeostasis on the Back of Digital Innovation

Ultimately, Hickey said he believes markets and people will adapt.

“People are clever and industrious,” he said. “Engineers are already being told, ‘You can’t use that material anymore, find an alternative.’ There’s always a railing that needs to be fixed. And the people who make those railings will find a way.”

At the same time, industry sentiment is that the administration’s approach will become more nuanced over time.

However, Hickey cautioned that the reshaping of global trade is a long-term play.

“You don’t fix 80 years of imbalance in one term,” he said. “My concern is how do you make sure this lasts longer than four years? Because if this gets reversed in 2028, all you’ve done is provide a lot of pain without lasting gain.”

There’s also a broader philosophical question emerging: Have Americans been underpaying for steel all along?

“Maybe the domestic price is actually the fair market price,” Hickey said. “We haven’t seen China’s books. Who knows how much they’re subsidizing their mills?”

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