Oddly enough it’s coal, from Clyde Russell: It’s not shaping up as a merry Christmas for coal exporters to Asia as the region’s top buyers, China and India, pull back from the recent trend of strong imports. The Chinese authorities appear to be making good on a commitment to try and limit the country’s imports
Iron ore prices for December 7, 2018: Spot up. Paper up. Steel up. Coking coal is very strong but I don’t think that can last. Chinese iron ore port stocks continue to draw down, hitting 138.6mt last week. Chinese imports of iron ore for November were at 86.2mt and the year is tracking below 2018
Via Argues: Brazil’s Samarco mine is likely to restart in early 2020, bringing a major source of high-grade iron ore back into the market, mining company Vale’s chief executive Fabio Schvartsman said today. “The worst part seems to be behind us,” Schvartsman said of the process to bring Samarco back on line after a fatal
Iron ore price charts for December 6, 2018: Spot down. Paper down more. Steel too. Planet coking coal drifting into its own orbit. I don’t expect much to happen between now and February. Look for flopping around in the $60-70 trading range.
EIA put out a timely reminder of the big picture for US oil. There has never been more proved reserves or production: A big part of this is the economics of shale oil. A typical oil well has economics that looks something like this: Source: Changing Paradigm for the Oil Industry: From Peak Oil Production
Iron ore prices for December 5, 2018: Everything pretty flat except steep production which remains off its face. While that remains the case prices will be under pressure. Though I see that as more a price cap than falls until February.
It is captured in this one chart from Art Berman: This one chart is the US shale revolution in global oil markets. What it shows is the forward curve for oil sales over time. As you can see, the curve has been smashed lower and flatter in recent weeks. What US shale does is find
Spot up. Paper up more. Steel futures shifted forward to May and slumped. Mill margins will be getting killed. Rebar inventories are still falling as nobody want to hold stock when prices are falling on over-production. There’s more pressure coming for iron ore once through the new year restock.
Via Capital Economics: The sharp fall in oil prices over the past month or so has led to several questions about the implications for the global economy. We’ve written lots on this subject, including how central banks might respond and why the major oil producers are now better positioned to weather a fall in prices than they were a
Iron ore prices for December 3, 2018: Spot up. Paper up. Steel up. But all well off their highs. Nothing too exciting here. I don’t expect prices to do too much over the next few months. Look to February for the next big move.
Doesn’t make a whole lot of sense does it? Over the past six months as China has slowed, iron ore has boomed. Every time the trade war intensified, it was bid up on hopes of more Chinese stimulus. Yet yesterday, as the trade war cooled off, iron ore boomed again. What is it, a magic pudding
By Leith van Onselen The RBA has released its commodity price index for November, which increased 1.2% in SDR (currency weighted) terms – the key determinant of the terms-of-trade – but fell by 1.2% in Australian dollar terms: Preliminary estimates for November indicate that the index increased by 1.2 per cent (on a monthly average
Iron ore prices for November 30, 2019: Spot down. Paper up. Steel struggling. Steel PMI trashed. Let’s look more closely at the latter: As a single industry PMI, the steel survey is much more volatile than any sector wide version. Nonetheless, it is a good guide to pivot points and trend changes. The key number
Iron ore price for November 29, 2018: Spot down. Paper more. Steel too. Doesn’t feel very strong. But the new year restock looms and it can’t get far to the downside with that backstop.
Iron ore prices for November 28, 2018: Spot up. Paper down. Steel up. Coking coal is rock solid. Is that really all it’s got? There’s no forced liquidation there. Just a few mills bashing the price lower for a few days to repair margins. Paper is still weak so there may be more ahead but
Iron ore prices for November 27, 2018: Spot stabilised. Paper is still soft. Steel rebounded. Whether it is already over is in the lap of the gods, via Reuters: China’s steel production hit a record 82.55 million tonnes in October, but steel prices and margins have since shrunk as China dialed back on winter output
Iron ore prices for November 26, 2018: Spot is now in an old school crash. Paper too but it is following. Coking coal is still relatively strong. Steel is still very high. Port stocks even higher! When we see these types of shakeouts it is because somebody has been caught on the wrong side
Iron ore prices for November 23, 2018: Spot routed. Paper following. Steel smashed. Yet rebar inventories are still down. It does not make complete sense. It looks like steel mills are overproducing and the steel price is sinking as a result. They are responding by destocking raw materials. All normal for this time of year.
Iron ore prices for November 22, 2018: Spot down hard despite soaring paper. For once the physical market dynamics might actually dictate price to the Dalian nutters. Steel is still weak. Looks like there’s further downside ahead as there should be.
Via the ABC: Australian households will be offered federal rebates to install solar storage batteries under a federal Labor energy policy that will also direct billions of taxpayer dollars at solar, wind and hydro projects. Though Mr Shorten is likely to frame ALP adoption of the NEG as an attempt to find common ground with
Iron ore prices for November 21, 2018: Spot flat. Paper roared. Steel fell again as CISA early November output remains very high. This is killing mills’ margins. It should see a destock of raw materials and falling prices but iron ore now trades as the perfect counter to any Cold War 2.0 news on hopes of
Iron ore prices for November 20, 2018: Spot, paper and steel all smashed. There should be more to come. Via Vertical Group: Over the past week we’ve had the chance to speak, on the phone, with a number of steel traders in China (i.e., CRM + Tangsong + SY + Min Metals + Liaoning Dongya
Iron ore prices for November 10, 2018: Spot up. Paper up more. Steel down. Doesn’t make much sense, I know, but is what it is!
Iron ore prices for November 16, 2018: Spot up. Paper down. Steel flat. Rebar stocks are crashing as Winter output shutdowns get underway. We should have already seen price draw downs by now. Whether they’ll still happen I have no idea. The next relatively certain period of material price action will be February when prices
November 15, 2018: Spot down. Paper soared. Steel is still fading. By rights we should be falling but this market has become almost impossible to call. Once upon a time it was one of the purest supply and demand markets around which made it easy to track. But the advent of futures, supply side
Because there is no doubt that it is in our national interest. Don’t get me wrong. This is not my usual line that Australian democracy needs the protection of a US hegemony to survive (although that is the primary benefit). This is much closer to home and much more needed today. Cold War 2.0 has
Chinese house prices for October are out and the path is for the Cold War 2.0 growth offset. As indutrial prouction takes a tariff hit, China’s is going to allow house prices to rise and build more empty apartments. October prices were up 1%: 64 of 70 cities are rising at 4% or above: Only
Iron ore price for November 14, 2018: Spot down. Paper held. Steel up on bad news is good news as China slows. I still us falling here.
It’s all so horribly predictable. Via the AFR: After announcing that the world has arrived at a “new era for energy”, Coleman asked: “Where is the vision from our leaders today?” …”as renewables achieve scale, we risk wasting money on building more power into the system, resulting in generation overload. We risk ending up in
Iron ore prices for November 13, 2018: Spot fell. Paper too. Steel held up. Late October CISA steel output came off sharply as it should with falling seasonal demand. Surely she’s going to break here. Demand is waning with questions over Chinese stimulus. Supply issues in Peru, Brazil and Pilbara are resolved. Mills are destocking
