Indian export offers for high grade iron ore fines (with Fe content of 63.5 percent and higher) remained range bound during most of the past week, but have slumped by $2/mt on the last trading day to $58-59/mt CFR China amid a negative outlook and the weaknesses of key drivers, traders said on Friday, August 26.
“For most of the week, there was extreme caution with few having any sense of the short-term direction of the market. The apparent stalemate has given way on the last day of the week, with offer levels falling amid the persisting lack of activity in the physical market and the weakness in the futures market,” an Odisha-based miner-exporter said.
“Most buyers who received offers earlier in the week had retreated anticipating a correction. But more than a correction, the loss has had more to do with uncertainties over finished steel prices and information on port stocks,” the miner-exporter added.
Market sources said that comparatively low stocks at pitheads, particularly in the eastern Indian state of Odisha, owing to the rainy season may provide modest support on the supply side for offer levels, but there may be further downside risks of around $2-3/mt in the short term if the absence of buyers persists.