Posted on 24 Aug 2020
Total iron ore concentrates at China’s 186 mining companies under Mysteel’s bi-weekly survey rose to a new high since Mysteel enlarged the sample size in January 2019, hitting 541,300 tonnes/day over August 7-20, as they had been eagerly stepping up the output on high prices and robust demand, market sources said on Friday.
During the survey period, the concentrates production among these miners rose for the third survey period by another 1,400 t/d or 0.3% on a fortnight, and their concentrating capacity utilization rate also went up another 0.17 percentage points in two weeks to 69.32%, also a new high since January 2019.
The strengthening in the domestically-produced concentrates prices, together with the rises in the imported iron ore prices had been the core factor for the higher output, especially when the demand from the Chinese steel mills had stayed robust, showing no signs of retreating on high prices, market sources noted.
As of August 20, the offering price of 66% grade concentrates in Tangshan, North China’s Hebei princes, where the competition among the domestic supplies had been the fiercest, also reached Yuan 1,000/dmt EXW and including 13% VAT for the first time since March 19 2014, or up another Yuan 35/dmt in two weeks, according to Mysteel’s database.
Robust demand while higher production saw the concentrates inventories at the 186 miners inch lower by just 2,000 tonnes on week to 2.54 million tonnes by August 20, according to the survey.
The inventories, however, may remain stable in the near term, as the heavy rains in Northeast China has disrupted the concentrates delivery, and some mills in East China have been looking for more affordable though lower-quality imported concentrates, lumps and pellets to substitute the overall higher-priced furnace feeds, the survey conductor shared.
An official from an iron ore mining company in Northeast China’s Liaoning confirmed that the recent rains have slightly affected their production, as the local authority has been especially stringent on workplace safety at mining sites.
Over August 7-20, Mysteel’s parallel bi-weekly survey among a smaller sample of China’s 126 iron ore mining companies showed that their concentrating capacity utilization rate rose by another 0.53 percentage points on a fortnight to 69.15% on average, and their in-house concentrate stocks rebounded 81,700 tonnes over the two weeks to 1.36 million tonnes by August 20.
Written by Zhiyao Li, lizy@mysteel.com
Edited by Hongmei Li, li.hongmei@mysteel.com
Source:Mysteel Global
