Market Verdict on Iron Ore：
• Neutral to bearish.
Macro
• China central bank held a conference to decrease the deposit reserve ratio, maintain leverage ratio, decrease Loan Prime Rate, and increase fulfillment of local debts.
• U.S. New York January PMI fell from 31.9 to -0.7, est. 25, the unexpected negative number was first seen since June 2020.
Iron Ore Key Indicators:
• Platts 62% 127.30 (+3.30), MTD 126.25. Iron ore seaborne trade actively yesterday based on the monetary loose support on Monday and Tuesday from China. However PBF have massive offers with very limited bids interested. Physical traders don’t want to hold any inventory across Chinese New Year and Beijing Winter Olympic Games.
• BHP expected western iron ore total production in 73.9 million tonnes. The annual production expected 249 – 259 million tonnes.
SGX Iron Ore 62% Futures& Options Open Interest (Jan 18th)
• Futures 86,136,600 tonnes(Increase 3,397,300 tonnes)
• Options 45,691,800 tonnes(Increase 1,780,000 tonnes)
Steel Key Indicators
• Ganggu Construction Steel Inventory: production 4.40 million tonnes, up 3.94% w-o-w. Mills inventory 3.43 million tonnes, up 14.55% w-o-w. Circulation inventory 5.64 million tonnes, up 8.07% w-o-w.
Coal Indicators
• Ganqimaodu port expected to recover import coking coal in 20th.
FIS API Blog
