BEIJING/SHANGHAI: Benchmark iron ore futures in China slipped about 3% on Monday, hurt by sluggish downstream demand and fresh environmental restrictions in a main steelmaking region.
The most-active iron ore futures contract on the Dalian Commodity Exchange, for January delivery, closed down 2.9% at 788.5 yuan ($116.49) per tonne, after dropping as much as 3.3% earlier.
“The decline was mainly due to downstream demand, which did not pick up as markets expected,” a Beijing-based ferrous trader said.
“Real estate developers are not very motivated... It’s possible that this year has no sales peak season for property.”
China’s top steelmaking city Tangshan had rolled out plans to curb sintering operations at some mills due to unfavourable weather conditions, state-run China Metallurgical News reported on Sunday.
Steel rebar on the Shanghai Futures Exchange dropped 1.6% to 3,553 yuan a tonne.
Hot-rolled coils slipped 1.4% to 3,677 yuan a tonne.
