Posted on 09 Jun 2021
China’s appetite for imported iron ore continued growing over January-May to reach around 471.8 million tonnes, higher by 26.9 million tonnes or 6% on year, though the pace had slowed marginally against the 6.7% on-year rise recorded for the first four months, the latest statistics released by the country's General Administration of Customs published on June 7 show.
The lower pace was mainly a consequence of the single-month fall in May where the iron ore import volume declined by 8.9% on month to reach around 89.8 million tonnes – or a one-year low, the data show.
“The slight decline was not so unexpected by the market,” a Shanghai-based analyst commented. “From my observation, iron ore shipments from Australia and Brazil had not seen any remarkable growth throughout most of during April and May, and the available iron ore quantities at Chinese ports have been barely adequate for a long time, especially when there was relatively firm iron ore demand from domestic steel mills.”
Mysteel’s survey showed that the blast furnace capacity utilization rate among the 247 Chinese steel mills under Mysteel’s survey had climbed to 91.41% over May 21-27 from 89.93% over April 23-29.
Meanwhile, as of April 27, the total stocks of imported iron ore at China’s 45 ports under Mysteel’s weekly survey had declined further to 126.2 million tonnes, or down 4 million tonnes from April 29.
Source:Mysteel Global
