Scrap, Metal Trading Site Closes

MetalSite,and its affiliated company Scrapsite announced that they are suspending operations June 8^th. Ralph Pinkert, president of ScrapSite, said that despite the company generating more than $60 million in transaction volume in the roughly one year it has been in business, the significant cost of running the operation has forced the company to close.

MetalSite,the parent company of ScrapSite, was launched in 1998 with support from WeirtonSteel, LTV Steel and several other large steel companies.

When cash began running short last year, MetalSite's steel industry backers had too many problems of their own to provide any more funds. MetalSite's nine stockholders had lent $35 million to the business, and MetalSite had not been paying interest on those loans, according to the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette.

In a statement fromScrapSite, the company wrote the following: “Despite our success, we serve an industry that continues to operate in a difficult business climate. These difficulties have made it necessary for MetalSite, and thus ScrapSite, to suspend their marketplace operations and to pursue the restructuring of its businesses.

The goal of this restructuring is for ScrapSite to return its eCommerce solutions to the industry as soon as possible.   For now, commerce activities on the site will be suspended as of the close of business on Friday, June 8th.  We encourage all of our users to take advantage of this time to close all open transactions and complete all activity reports on or before this day.”