In the January-November period this year, China imported 1078.418 million mt of iron ore, up 6.2 percent year on year, as announced by the Chinese customs authorities on December 7.
In November alone, China imported 102.743 million mt of iron ore, rising by 3.94 percent year on year, while increasing by 3.4 percent month on month.
In November, import iron ore prices moved on an overall uptrend until November 22, while they started to move down in the last few days of the month as the government moved to cool down speculation in the iron ore market. However, demand for iron ore has been quite good so far in December as steelmakers’ capacity utilization rates have been at relatively decent levels. Following the downward corrections in iron ore prices during late November and early December, iron ore prices have moved up again amid the rebounding trend of iron ore futures prices.