WEEKLY: China mills' imported iron ore stocks fall amid slower buying

Chinese steelmakers continued to consume large volumes of iron ore to support robust hot metal production, but buying interest in imported ore weakened as more mills slipped into losses. As a result, mills' in-plant iron ore inventories had fallen during the survey week of June 25-July 1.

As of July 1, total inventories of imported iron ore sintering fines held by the 64 Chinese blast-furnace (BF) steel mills under Mysteel's tracking declined by 205,200 tonnes or 1.4% on week to 14.27 million tonnes. Falling steel prices continued to squeeze margins at Chinese steelmakers. Mysteel's separate survey of