Global: Iron ore prices will decline

Related media January 11 news: This year's global iron ore demand growth will slow down, iron ore prices will also drop from record highs last year. Steve Randall, general manager of SteelIndex, a reference price provider in London, said that the market forecast that the average spot price of 62% of ore fines exported to Chinese ports this year will drop from $168/ton last year to $150 to $160/ton. According to the steel index, iron ore prices were 14% higher than last year. The record price of iron ore spot prices appeared in March 2008. At the peak of commodity boom, the spot price of iron ore exceeded US$200/tonne, but then the average price of iron ore dropped in the wake of the global financial crisis. To 150 US dollars / ton or less.

This year's iron ore average price is likely to fall to the level of 2008, mainly due to the slowdown in China's steel production, which consumes more than half of the world's iron ore output. Last year, China's crude steel production increased by 8.5% to 680 million tons, but according to market estimates, this year's crude steel output growth rate will drop to 5%. China’s crude steel output declined in November and December last year, resulting in a forecast of 20 million tons of crude steel production from the country’s crude oil production of 700 million tons last year.

According to data from the Brussels-based Global Steel Association, global crude steel production increased by only 1% year-on-year in November last year, while capacity utilization of steel mills fell to a low of 73.4% in the year and to 76.5% in October. However, from January to November last year, global crude steel production increased by 7.4% year-on-year. Randall said that last year iron ore prices opened higher and lower, and this year is very likely the opposite. From January to early October last year, the price of iron ore was US$162-190/ton, and then it fell to US$120/ton in October.