WEEKLY: China mills' imported iron ore stocks peak ahead of holiday

Chinese steelmakers continued to build up their imported iron ore stocks over the past week as the Chinese New Year (CNY) holiday over February 15-23 drew closer, but the pace of restocking has slowed down.

During February 5-11, inventories of imported iron ore sintering fines at the 64 Chinese blast-furnace steel producers under Mysteel's tracking increased for the fifth straight week to 18.4 million tonnes. The latest on-week increase was 584,100 tonnes or 3.3%, smaller than the 10.4% rise, or 1.7 million tonnes, recorded