Indian export offers for high grade iron ore fines (with Fe content of 63.5 percent and higher) have increased by $1/mt during the past week to $67/mt CFR China, amid scarce trading and a pessimistic outlook, traders said on Friday, May 11.
“Offers are tending to move in a narrow range and buyers are retreating from the market at every marginal uptrend - this being an indication that there are doubts over higher levels sustaining and that buyers prefer to wait for a downturn before concluding any transactions,” an Odisha-based miner-exporter said.
“Doubts over the gains sustaining have been prompted by the market feeling that such gains are a reaction to futures’ speculation both in raw material and finished steel, rather than based on any consolidation in the physical market,” the miner-exporter added.
Market sources said that, with cheaper raw materials available at Chinese ports, traders representing Chinese steel mills have less appetite to conclude transactions at every rise in offer levels, resulting in the sharp fall in volumes during the past week.
At the same time, Indian aggregating traders were largely staying away from the market facing logistical problems of building stocks at ports owing to disruptions of transportation as summer temperatures peak at mines, particularly in eastern India, and this has also contributed to low activity in the market, the sources added.