SteelMint’s pellet export index (FoB east coast India) has increased sharply by $6/t w-o-w to $121/t on Wednesday (i.e 09th Sept). Prices increased due to limited offers from India and increasing spot iron ore fines prices.
Confirmed trades of last week – Two trades were concluded for China towards the end of last week. However, they have not been considered under T1. Both the deals were concluded by Odisha based pellet makers at $133-134/t CFR China for end Sep’20 shipments.
Deals reported last week:
Methodology – No pellet export deal has been concluded so far this week, so there was no T1 category of inputs.
SteelMint has received around seven indicative prices and bids in this publishing window. All were considered for price calculation as T2 inputs with an average price of $121/t.
T1 includes confirmed deals while offers, bids, and indicative prices are included as T2 inputs.
Market overview – Chinese spot iron ore fines (Fe 62%) prices remained stable w-o-w to $129/t CFR as against at $128/t CFR China last week. Spot prices are continuously trading at a higher level on an optimistic demand outlook.
As the medium grade fines prices are trading high, led the margin decreased for Chinese steel mills. On the other side, stricter pollution control measures in the second round of China reducing the sintering process led the pellet price supported. However, limited offers are seen from the Indian pellet maker’s side as the domestic market continues to remain lucrative.
A couple of Indian pellet makers (from central & eastern India) are looking to conclude export deals.
However, majority of Indian pellet makers are mostly focusing to explore the domestic market as they are still look more lucrative than the export realization.
Pellet inventory at major Chinese ports has been decreasing from the last two weeks around 0.6 mn t to 10.3 mn t last week against 10.9 mn t a week ago as per Steelhome data.
Leave a Reply