According to Mining News Pro -Iron pellet premiums have hit an all-time high thanks to Chinese imports.
China
has been reducing its domestic magnetite production in favour of
imported pellets in part to reduce emissions and improve productivity.
The
China blast furnace iron pellet premium (65 per cent) has seen a jump
of $US3.30 ($4.60) per dry metric tonne (dmt) to $US87.50/dmt
($121.90/dmt).
This rise in crude steel output is in line with
World Steel Association figures suggesting a Chinese and global trend,
with year-on-year (YoY) steel production up 7.2 per cent in China and
5.8 per cent globally in July 2018.
The Chinese Government has set
out ambitious carbon targets in a bid to lower climate changing
emissions — it met its 2020 target three years ahead of schedule last
year, cutting carbon dioxide emissions by 46 per cent.
According to a report from S&P Global Platts entitled SBB Steel Markets Daily,
increasing coke prices in China have supported the demand for pellet,
with large-size steelmakers “still buying seaborne pellet cargoes
continuously”.
The increase in imports to Asian countries bodes well for Australian producers such as Carpentaria, which last month entered
into an $86 million supply deal with Mitsui — one of Japan’s ‘big five’
sogo shosha (trading houses) — at the Hawsons iron project near Broken
Hill, New South Wales.