Indian export offers for high grade iron ore fines (with Fe content of 63.5 percent and higher) have remained range-bound during the past week at $64.50/mt CFR China, almost the same as at the close of the previous week as traders representing Chinese steel mills continuing to shun Indian fines, traders said on Friday, July 13.
“Buyers continued to show no interest in Indian fines as in earlier weeks. Restocking by Chinese steel mills in the local market is almost negligible. We hear that Chinese steel mills are facing restrictions aimed at reducing pollution emissions and hence they are cagey about restocking raw materials,” an Odisha-based miner-exporter said.
“Apart from the lack of buying interest, the low activity can also be attributed to aggregating traders unable to meet delivery commitments owing to reasons ranging from monsoon rains and transportation logjams in Odisha,” the miner-exporter added.
According to two other traders, the low activity market is particularly of concern because the physical market during the past week did not react to the trend of raw material futures contracts, indicating the fundamental weakness in the iron ore market.
“It has been reported here in the Indian market that Chinese iron ore imports have declined by around 12 percent during June compared to the corresponding month of the previous year,” one of the traders said.