Canada’s border tax started today. Steel is 50 percent. Casters stayed at 25.

If you buy steel, sell or ship U.S. goods into Canada, or pay a truck to move product, read this before you accept a revised quote. One charge changed at midnight. The others did not. Mixing them up is how a 50 percent steel tax lands on a caster, or a fuel surcharge uses last week’s diesel.

At 12:01 a.m. on September 8, 2026, Canada started a border tax on a published list of U.S. goods. The Department of Finance puts that list at $27.6 billion. A border tax is a percentage added when the goods enter Canada. It is not a new price from the mill, and it is not a change to your catalog.

Steel and aluminum that were already being taxed moved from 25 percent to 50 percent. Forklifts, the machines that lift and move loads, are at 15 percent under customs codes 8427.10.10 and 8427.20.10. A customs code is the product number on the paperwork, not the name in a sales email. Metal casters, code 8302.20.00, stay at 25 percent. That caster rate is dated March 13, 2025. It did not change today.

Goods already on the road to Canada when the tax started are not covered. Canada’s notice says the measures do not apply to U.S. goods that were in transit on the day they took effect. If a load left before midnight, ask the broker whether that exemption applies before you pay a revised invoice. This tax is charged by Canada on U.S. goods coming in. It is not a U.S. tax on Canadian goods coming here.

If you are shipping U.S. goods into Canada

Three rates. Do not let a vendor collapse them into one. Source: Department of Finance Canada, effective 12:01 a.m. September 8, 2026.

On any quote for U.S. goods entering Canada, ask for three things. The customs code. The rate on that code. Whether the goods were already in transit at midnight. Steel is the 50 percent question. A forklift is the 15 percent question. A caster code that still reads 25 percent is a third question. Do not accept a single “new Canadian duty” line until those answers are written down. The $27.6 billion figure is the size of the whole program, not a count of your shipments. The official list settles a dispute. A sales email does not.

Shop industrial casters on CasterHQ: plate-mount casters. This is not a duty ruling and not a specification. CasterHQ sells casters and drive wheels. Some of those products can fall under a caster customs heading. No government office reviewed this article.

The mill raised coil this morning

If you buy hot-rolled steel, the mill price moved today, separate from the Canada tax. Nucor told customers on September 8 that the price it is offering for hot-rolled coil is $1,190 a short ton this week, up $5 from a week earlier. That is the seventh weekly increase in a row, $55 over that stretch. The letter still offers delivery in three to five weeks, the same as last week. On the West Coast, California Steel Industries’ offer is $1,250 a short ton, also up $5.

Those are mill offers. They are not the Canada tax, and they are not a price for a caster. If that coil is also being shipped from the United States into Canada, you can be looking at two charges. The mill’s $1,190, and a 50 percent border tax if the customs code is a steel code. A caster order does not pick up either charge unless the product and the destination say so.

Steel Market Update’s average for hot-rolled coil was $1,205 a short ton on September 1, up $5 that week. That is last Tuesday’s survey. Use Nucor’s letter for today. Use the survey only as last week’s market average.

What a U.S. truck costs right now

If you pay a broker to move freight inside the United States, use the truck rate, not a ship index. DAT’s report for August 30 through September 5, published this morning, put the national average paid to the carrier at $2.95 a mile for a dry van, up 6 cents. A refrigerated trailer was $3.54, up 9 cents. A flatbed was $3.54, up 4 cents. Those rates include the fuel surcharge, the extra the carrier adds for diesel.

Load posts were just under 3.0 million, down 3 percent. Truck posts were 178,484, up 3 percent, as trucks that sat out last week’s inspection blitz started to come back. More trucks, and the rates still rose. DAT said the fuel part of that report used the government diesel price of $5.652 a gallon, the week ending August 24.

The diesel page checked on the evening of September 8 showed a newer week, the week of August 31, at $5.599 a gallon, down 5.3 cents from $5.652. The truck report you can read this morning is still using the older week. Do not let a carrier rewrite a quote off a diesel number that report has not used. On that August 31 page, California diesel was $7.218. Gulf Coast diesel was $5.360. Regular gasoline was $4.071. Those are national and regional averages, not your invoice.

Highway diesel the energy agency has posted. This morning’s truck report still used the week of August 24, $5.652. Source: U.S. Energy Information Administration, page checked September 8, 2026.

If a carrier adds a fuel surcharge today, ask which diesel week it uses. $5.652 matches this morning’s truck report. $5.599 matches the newer government week. Anything else needs a source.

Share prices, and why they are in here

You do not buy these shares to run a plant. They are here because, on the same afternoon, the companies that make machines rose and the companies that move freight fell. That is a clue about how the day was read. It is not an order to place, and it is not a truck rate.

At 3:00 p.m. Central, Yahoo Finance showed Caterpillar at $822.48, up about 3.1 percent from $797.47. Deere was $680.73, up about 3.9 percent from $654.91. Union Pacific, the railroad, was $288.45, down about 4.1 percent from $300.67. FedEx was $314.13, down about 4.1 percent from $327.40. A fund that holds a wide set of industrial companies, called XLI, was $174.42, down about 0.4 percent. The fund barely moved because the two sides mostly cancelled. These are afternoon prices, not the official closing auction.

Afternoon share prices. Machinery up, freight companies down. Source: Yahoo Finance, September 8, 2026, 3:00 p.m. Central.

A ship cost, not your truck

The Baltic Dry Index is the daily cost of hiring a ship for dry cargo such as grain, coal, and ore. It is not the $2.95 van rate. Monday it was 3,575. Tuesday it was 3,584, up 9 points, in Hellenic Shipping News. Ocean freight barely moved. It does not change what you pay a truck inside the United States.

Ask this before you accept the quote

What customs code is on the paperwork, and is the rate 50, 25, or 15? Were the U.S. goods already on the road into Canada at midnight? If there is a fuel surcharge, is it using $5.652 or $5.599?

If you are buying hot-rolled coil this week, Nucor’s offer is $1,190 a short ton, up $5, with delivery in three to five weeks. That is the mill. It is not the border tax. If the coil is also going to Canada, those are two charges, not one.

Shop industrial casters at CasterHQ

For catalog plate-mount replacements, browse plate-mount casters. This article reports public tax lines, a mill price, and freight rates. It does not claim a duty outcome for a CasterHQ order, and it is not a fitment guide.