Positive sentiment boosts further rise in China's manganese ore prices
...
China's manganese ore prices continued to head north this week, as sentiment in the domestic market remained positive with limited arrivals of this ore to China's major ports and the strong performance in futures prices of silico manganese, Mysteel Global learned.
As of April 24, the price of South Africa-origin 36.5% grade Mn ore at North China's Tianjin port was assessed by Mysteel at Yuan 40/dmtu ($5.5/dmtu) including the 13% VAT, jumping by Yuan 3.5/dmtu on week and touching the highest since July 7 2022.
The further rally in manganese ore prices was partly due to the fact that the volume of this ore delivered to China decreased, and ore shipments from Australia may not resume in the near term.
On Monday, South32 Ltd., the world's largest manganese miner headquartered in Perth, Western Australia, released in its quarterly report that its operations at the Australia Manganese joint venture have been suspended after Tropical Cyclone Megan last month, which brought significant damage to critical infrastructure, including the wharf and port infrastructure, and severely impacted operations at Groote Eylandt.
Wharf operations may not recommence until January-March 2025, and the company is trying to find alternative shipping options to mitigate the impact of the wharf outage, according to the report.
Inventories of manganese ore at China's major ports emptied with limited arrivals to the ports and improved transactions of this ore in the physical market. Mysteel's latest weekly survey showed that as of April 19, total stocks of this ore at China's major ports registered 5.15 million tonnes, lower by 83,000 tonnes from the previous week.
Besides, silico manganese prices in the derivatives market have strengthened continuously recently, boosting optimism in the domestic market, Mysteel Global noted.
On April 24, the most-traded silico manganese contract on the Zhengzhou Futures Exchange for delivery in September closed higher for the 10th consecutive working day at Yuan 7,078/t, surging by Yuan 670/t from the settlement price on April 17, according to the exchange's data.
Chinese silico manganese prices in the spot market also witnessed substantial growth this week, with the national price of 6517 silico manganese under Mysteel's assessment reaching Yuan 6,333/t including the 13% VAT as of April 24, up by Yuan 466/t compared with one week earlier.
Note: This article has been written in accordance with an article exchange agreement between Mysteel Global and BigMint.