Iron ore futures had a choppy session today, reaching a peak at the close of the morning session, but only to decline later in the afternoon session.
The most-traded May iron ore contract on China’s Dalian Commodity Exchange (DCE) however, managed to stay positive and rose slightly by 0.10% on-day or RMB 1 to RMB 1,034.50/mt on Wednesday.
The steel rebar contract on the Shanghai Futures Exchange then, went down slightly by 0.26% or RMB 11 day on-day to RMB 4,293/mt.
Lower daily trading volume of construction steel due to cold winter
China’s daily trading volume of construction steels had dropped to a 10-month low, due to the cold winter that hampered construction activities.
According to Mysteel, the daily trading volume of construction steel dipped by RMB 15,666 mt per day or 10.5% day-on-day to 133,357 mt per day. These construction steel products consisted of rebar, wire rod and bar-in-coil, with survey done on 237 domestic steel traders.
So far, the cold, harsh winter had hindered much of the construction activities in northern China, and even disrupted transportation and logistics in coastal regions, where ships were stuck at ports due to bad weather.
Rising coronavirus cases to suspend construction activities in Hebei
Meanwhile, trade participants were concerned about the rising coronavirus cases in Hebei, with the epic-center of the outbreak located in the provincial capital city of Shijiazhuang.
According to Mysteel, many construction sites had suspended operation in the province, including the mega project of Xiong’an New Area.
In the meantime, truck transportation was heard to be halted in favor of railway transportation in Hebei, which might cause some delivery issues in the distribution of finished steel products from mills to the end-users.