Nucor is ready to help ‘rebuild this country’, says CEO

Nucor’s chief executive on Tuesday applauded the Senate’s approval of the bipartisan infrastructure package, telling CNBC’s Jim Cramer that the steelmaker was eager to help “rebuild this country.”

Investors also reacted on Tuesday to the crucial role Nucor will play in those efforts, pushing the company’s shares up 9.6% to close at $ 118.10 apiece. The stock hit an intraday high of $ 118.93 during the session. Nucor was also the best performing component of the S&P 500.

“Today has been an important day for our nation. Seeing bipartisan support for Senate approval is such an important milestone,” Nucor CEO Leon Topalian said in an interview on “Mad Money”, adding that this is the closest the United States has come to. a “significant infrastructure bill” during his roughly 25 years in the steel industry.

The $ 1,000 billion bill has yet to clear the Democratic-controlled House of Representatives before it can get to President Joe Biden’s desk and be enacted. In the Senate, 19 Republicans joined with 50 Democrats in passing the bill, which includes $ 550 billion in funding, which will modernize roads, water systems, transit systems and power grids, as well as expanding broadband access.

“As Nucor sees it, it’s really through a lens of about three things,” Topalian said. “It’s about America’s security. America’s competitiveness and finally, the resurgence of American manufacturing. If we’ve learned anything from this pandemic, it’s that this nation has to be a nation. who makes and builds things here in America. “

Shares of North Carolina-based Nucor have risen 122% year-to-date, benefiting not only from the prospect of infrastructure upgrades but also from the broader economic recovery from the Covid crisis . Follow steelmaker US Steel up 68.81% year-to-date.

The entire U.S. steel industry is well positioned to benefit from the infrastructure bill, should Biden eventually sign it, Topalian said.

“We are the cleanest steelmakers on the planet, and ready and ready to go again,” he said. “If you think about the investment China is making, last year alone they spent $ 8 trillion on infrastructure. We have to stay competitive as a nation.”