WEEKLY: China mills' imported iron ore stocks, usage both increase

After falling steadily for almost a month, inventories of imported iron ore sintering fines held by the 64 Chinese blast-furnace (BF) steelmakers under Mysteel's weekly survey began to increase during October 30-November 5, with the volume up by a marked 572,100 tonnes or 4.6% on week to 13 million tonnes.

The rising stocks at the surveyed mills mainly resulted from their brisker purchases of imported iron ore recently when prices of the steelmaking raw material lost ground. For example, Mysteel PORTDEX 62% Australian Fines in Qingdao moved lower by Yuan 25/wmt ($3.5/wmt) from a week ago to sit at