India export offers for high grade
iron ore fines (with Fe content of 63.5 percent and higher) have continued to languish below the psychological mark of the $80/mt during the past week in the range of $78-79/mt CFR China, traders said on Tuesday, November 4.
"Current offer levels are merely indicative with no buyers and no transaction volumes. Sellers are just putting out lower offers but with no response from buyers. With even sub-$80/mt offers not finding any support, the market is expecting the poor demand situation to worsen," an Orissa-based miner-exporter said.
"Traders who are basically aggregators of volumes from pitheads have all retreated from the market as current prices do not offer them any margins. Only a few miner-exporters have submitted offers for small volumes to traders representing Chinese steel mills, but have not attracted any response," he said.
Market sources said that export offers have very limited upside potential and market expectations are for prices to settle below the $80/mt mark.
Excess supply coupled with the lack of appetite of Chinese steel mills for stocking raw materials will continue to mount pressure on prices, the sources said.