WEEKLY: Chinese steel mills' imported iron ore stocks largely stable

Chinese steelmakers have recently scaled back their iron ore consumption, reflecting their reduced enthusiasm for steel production as most mills continue to grapple with negative steel margins. As a result, their interest in restocking this key steelmaking raw material has remained lukewarm, with in-plant stocks of imported fines showing little change, Mysteel Global noted.

Total stocks of imported iron ore sintering fines held by the 64 Chinese blast-furnace (BF) steel mills under Mysteel's tracking stood at 13.7 million tonnes by September 9, edging up by just 6,400 tonnes from a week earlier. In the first three days of this week, the traded volume of