As of July 30, iron ore inventories across 35 ports tracked by SMM totaled 120.7 million mt, up 740,000 mt from the previous week and up 14.77 million mt year-on-year. Daily average deliveries from the 35 ports decreased 174,000 mt on a weekly basis to 2.28 million mt last week. Inventory at two major ports in Tangshan grew 4.6% as heavy rain caused the daily average deliveries from ports to fall 12% to 317,000 mt and as arrivals continued to increase. Deliveries from major ports in the Yangtze River region also fell sharply as many ports across Jiangsu, Zhejiang and Shanghai temporarily closed due to the typhoon “In-Fa”. Deliveries from major ports will pick up after the impact from bad weather fades. Iron ore prices in the physical port stock market dropped by 40yuan/mt when DCE iron ore futures market plummeted sharply. Some steel mills increased their procurements given the low-level in-plant inventory, and thus total transactions picked up slightly. PBF was concluded at 1290yuan/mt in Shandong market, with price down of 30yuan/mt. As more and more steel mills started conducting maintenance, iron ore prices will suffer increasing pressures.
Source: Metals Market Index (MMi)