Steel and aluminum stocks rose in the premarket Thursday after reports that a major trade announcement from the White House could be coming.
Shares of U.S. Steel jumped 3.4 percent before the bell while AK Steel surged 5.6 percent. Century Aluminum rose 4.4 percent on low premarket volume.
On Wednesday night, The Washington Post reported that the White House was planning to make an announcement on steel and aluminum imports on Thursday. Executives from top U.S. steel and aluminum companies had been invited to the White House for an emergency meeting on Thursday, a person familiar with the matter told CNBC.
The White House has been working on implementing tariffs on metals imports since last year. In June, Axios reported President Donald Trump was “hell-bent” on imposing tariffs on steel and other imports.
On Thursday, Trump reiterated his desire for changes to U.S. trade in the steel and aluminum industries, tweeting the industries “have been decimated by decades of unfair trade and bad policy with countries from around the world.”
Among the recommendations from the Commerce Department’s Section 232 investigation completed earlier this month was a 24 percent global tariff on steel imports.
U.S. Steel shares are up 24 percent this year.
—CNBC’s Kayla Tausche contributed to this report.
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