Indian export offers for high grade iron ore fines (with Fe content of 63.5 percent and higher) have declined by $3/mt over the past week to the range of $80-81/mt CFR China in volatile market conditions, traders said on Tuesday, October 21.
"Market conditions have been rather volatile and gains in offers early in the week have not been sustained as buyers have been nervous about concluding transactions at higher levels," an Orissa based miner-exporter said.
"Initially offers firmed up after previously having fallen too rapidly. There were also speculative reports of a reversal of softening trends in Chinese long products markets, which triggered some buying interest," he said. "However, sentiments suffered a setback as soon as the market perceived no fundamental change. The upward movement in steel prices proved short-lived and Chinese steel mills have showed little inclination to restock raw materials, negatively impacting Indian offer levels," he added.
Market sources also said that the temporary gains in offer levels mostly reflected speculative gains in futures prices rather than changes in the fundamentals of the physical market and this volatility was again reflected in Indian offers.
Local traders and miner-exporters have been keeping a close watch to see whether support at $80/mt will be sustained even though any sustainable revival in offers is being ruled out, resulting in local traders sharply reducing offer volumes over the past few weeks, the sources said.