Today， DCE iron ore futures first fell and then rebounded today. The most-traded contract I2605 eventually closed at 809 yuan/mt, down 0.74% from the previous trading session. Traders were only moderately active in offering prices, while steel mills made fewer inquiries, with purchases mainly driven by rigid demand. Overall, transactions in the spot market were relatively subdued. Last week, SMM’s total global iron ore shipments rose 4.13 million WoW to 31.97 million mt, up 14.85%. Meanwhile, total port arrivals in China reached 28.13 million mt, up 5.06 million WoW, an increase of 21.93%. The surge in port arrivals further highlighted resistance on the fundamentals side. At the same time, the release of certain iron ore products from ports also weighed on today’s spot procurement demand. Together, these factors curbed bullish sentiment toward iron ore to some extent. Looking ahead, although the supply side was relatively loose this week, blast furnaces that had undergone maintenance earlier are expected to resume production in a concentrated manner this week. The market is expected to shift into a structure of both strong supply and demand this week. Meanwhile, the iron ore market has once again entered a phase of structural shortage, while continuously rising freight rates also provided cost support for iron ore. Therefore, ore prices are expected to hover at highs or hold up well in the short term.

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Source: Metals Market Index (MMI)