Producer Price Index for iron and steel scrap, the recycled feedstock input to electric arc furnace steelmaking, tracked separately from finished steel mill product prices. Index base: 1982 = 100.
Latest value
580.548
Index · as of Aug 2026
Year-over-year change
+10.1%
BLS
Month-over-month change
-1.5%
Latest value is 1 month old. Next update expected around Sep 2026.
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Enter a base value, a current value, and a contract amount to see the adjustment.
Price history
Data & insights
Key figures
From Jan 2024 to Aug 2026 the index went from 620.2 to 580.5, a change of -6.4%.
Highest reading in that period: 620.2 in Jan 2024. Lowest: 514.7 in Dec 2024.
Largest one-month rise: +8.2% in Feb 2025. Largest one-month fall: -7.9% in Mar 2024.
For a clause that resets its base every year, a 10% cap or floor would have limited the adjustment in 4 of the last 20 months.
Volatility (12mo)
±2.81%
Std. dev. of month-over-month change
Strongest average month-over-month move historically: January (+4.5% avg).
What this means for your clause
Scrap purchase agreements between steel mills and scrap dealers use this series directly rather than a finished product index, since scrap and finished steel prices can diverge sharply when scrap export demand or furnace utilization shifts.
Draft a clause
A starting point citing this series by name and code. Replace the bracketed terms with your contract's actual scope before use.
The [affected portion] of the Contract Price shall be adjusted using US PPI — Iron and Steel Scrap (BLS series WPU1012), published by BLS.
Base Period: the index value published for August 2026 (or the month of contract signing, if different) is the Base Value.
Adjustment: at each Adjustment Date, the Current Value is the most recently published three-month average of the index (the Averaging Window). The Escalation Factor equals Current Value divided by Base Value.
Cap: the Escalation Factor applied under this clause shall not exceed 1.10 or fall below 0.90 (a 10% cap and floor) in any single Adjustment Date, regardless of the index's actual movement.
[Replace bracketed terms with your contract's actual affected-portion definition and adjustment-date schedule before use. This is a drafting starting point, not legal advice.]
A steel PPI escalation clause compares a current-period Producer Price Index value for a named steel series to the value at contract signing (the base period), turns that into a ratio, then applies the ratio to the contract price or affected line items. Clauses typically define the exact BLS series code, an averaging window, a publication lag, and a cap limiting the maximum adjustment.
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