Prices of ex-Australia iron ore of 62 percent Fe content for delivery to China’s Qingdao port, which closed last week on a downward trend, have decreased by $1/mt since last Friday, starting the current week at $78.7-79.5/mt CFR China. As of December 26, inventory of iron ore at 33 major Chinese ports amounted to 99.02 million mt, down 120,000 mt or 0.12 percent compared to the inventory level recorded on December 19, as announced by China's Xinhua News Agency.
Over the past week, global coking coal prices have continued their soft trend and declined by approximately six percent, while global iron ore prices have continued to fluctuate and have decreased by 0.7 percent due to the slackening of trading activity in steel markets ahead of the New Year and since semi-finished and finished steel prices in China have moved downwards. As a result, during the past two weeks, global iron ore prices have continued to fluctuate but have softened.
Recently, coking coal and iron ore buyers in China have slowed down their bookings, adopting a wait-and-see stance, due to their expectations that the Chinese government will implement more production cuts in crude steel output in order to reduce environmental pollution, due to seasonal sluggishness amid winter weather conditions, and also amid expectations that the Chinese economy will slacken in 2017. Given these market conditions, there are increased expectations that iron ore prices will fluctuate on a soft trend as of the beginning of the Chinese New Year.