Commodity market news on March 4, 2022
SMALL INDUSTRY NEWS
WORLD'S GOODS HIGHLIGHTS DAY 04.03
The domestic demand for imported scrap iron and steel in the first months of the year has fallen sharply in the past 6 years when steel mills are increasing their purchases from the domestic market. Imports of scrap iron and steel in January decreased by 69% compared to the previous December and by 57% compared to the same period last year, at 177 thousand tons, the lowest volume since February 2016.
GOODS MARKET NEWS TODAY
Iron ore prices surge to half-year high as China begins easing disease control measures
On the Singapore Commodity Exchange, iron ore prices are trading in the range of $159 - $161/ton, the highest price recorded since July last year. Along with the upward trend in commodity prices due to the impact of the Russia-Ukraine tension, the world iron ore price skyrocketed thanks to the fact that economic experts noticed that China has begun to gradually ease the measures. extremely strict disease control measures from the Winter Olympics onwards.
Many unofficial sources said that China will consider and consider reopening and allowing travel in some cities from June here when the weather turns to summer. The optimism about the prospect of economic recovery, especially the resumption of many public investment projects that were delayed or delayed due to the epidemic, caused the iron ore market to have the strongest increase since. from the beginning of the year until now. However, it is still too early to be optimistic about this opening of China, because the strain of Omicron virus is still spreading rapidly in the community.
Earlier, China was also concerned about the occurrence of iron ore speculation in the context of unstable supply. Especially after the war between Russia and Ukraine broke out, some comments said that China's intervention in the iron ore market to stabilize prices could not cause iron ore prices to fall in the short term.
On the first day of the week, the China Iron and Steel Association also announced a plan to increase iron ore mining output at overseas mines to 220 million tons by 2025, as well as increase domestic raw material supply in order to basically solve the problem of shortage of raw materials for steel production in the next 10-15 years.