The blast furnace (BF) capacity utilization rate among 247 Chinese steel mills under Mysteel’s regular survey rebounded to 82.56% over January 6-12, up by 0.63 percentage point on week from the prior week’s dip, as some BFs in North and East China had resumed operations, according to Mysteel’s latest survey.
During the survey period, these 247 mills produced a total of 2.22 million tonnes of hot metal per day, up by 15,800 tonnes/day on week, and their BF operational rate also rose by 1.04 percentage points on week to 75.68% as of January 12.
The growth in hot metal output was mainly because some mills in northern and eastern regions of China had brought certain BFs back on stream during the survey week after completing regular or annual maintenance works on these furnaces, a Shanghai-based market analyst shared her observation.
Correspondingly, daily consumption of imported iron ore among the surveyed steel mills grew too by 9,100 t/d on week to total 2.73 million t/d as of January 12, or a new high since July 2022, according to Mysteel’s tracking.
During the survey period, some Chinese steel mills continued procuring iron ore in the spot market, either to resume some production or to prepare for smooth production during the Chinese New Year holiday in late January, Mysteel Global noted.
By January 12, inventories of imported iron ore in all forms at these 247 mills including ore sitting at steelworks, port stockyards and on the water increased for the eighth straight week by another 2.85 million tonnes on week to 102.4 million tonnes, a new high since July 2022. And the total tonnage would be sufficient for 37.47 days of their consumption, or 0.92 day longer on week.
The higher steel output and steady demand for iron ore have firmly bolstered the iron ore prices over the survey period, with Mysteel’s SEADEX 62% Australian Iron Ore Fines index, for example, having increased by $7/dmt on week to $123.45/dmt CFR Qingdao as of January 12.
Written by Lindsey Liu, liulingxian@mysteel.com
Note: This article has been written in accordance with an article exchange agreement between Mysteel Global and SteelMint.
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