Indian export offers for high grade iron ore fines (with Fe content of 63.5 percent and higher) have come under pressures of correction, losing $4/mt during the past week to $61.62/mt CFR China as buyers retreated awaiting a new bottom, traders said on Friday, June 19.
"The much anticipated correction has set in during the week and the upward momentum has been checked. Buyers are unwilling to conclude transactions and prefer to wait for the next bottom, possibly around the $60/mt mark in the short term," an Orissa-based miner-exporter said.
"The momentum in the market has also been checked by the lack of definitive stock positions at Chinese ports. The need to restock might have been exaggerated," the miner-exporter added.
However, some market sources said the correction has been anticipated as export offers were being driven by the futures market and prices were now reacting to some unwinding of over-bought futures contracts.
At the same time, some miner-exporters may have difficulties in supplying volumes since the spread of the monsoon rains across the eastern and western iron ore provinces will limit production and most exporters will have to depend on pithead and port stocks to meet transaction commitments, which would keep pressures on prices for the next few months.