SHANGHAI, May 15 (SMM) – Iron ore supplies in the Chinese market are likely to continue growing in the short term as deliveries arriving Chinese ports, and shipments departing foreign ports continue to rise, SMM believes.

Some 76 vessels with 11 million mt of iron ore are expected to arrive at major Chinese ports during May 11-17, up 285,000 mt from 10.72 million mt during May 4-10. This marked a second consecutive week of growth.

For the same period, the volume of iron ore departing Australian ports is likely to increase 1.1% to 16 million mt; and those leaving Brazilian ports are likely to grow 3.4% to 8.27 million mt.

Iron ore deliveries arriving at Rizhao and Jingtang ports are expected to increase during this period. However, those arriving at Qingdao are likely to dip as the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO) Summit may weigh on the iron ore shipments from Qingdao port. Recent, higher freight charges will also affect shipments.

The most liquid contract on the Dalian Commodity Exchange rose from lows during the day and traded rangebound within a wide range. In the spot market, offers dipped in the morning as futures declined. Offers inched up in the afternoon as prices of futures rebounded, in line with the DCE as it rose from lows and traded rangebound. 

SMM's MMi Iron Ore Port Index stood at 477 yuan/wmt fot Qingdao on Tuesday for 62% Fe fines, down 7 yuan/wmt from Monday May 14. 

The index for 58% Fe fines remained unchanged at 330 yuan/wmt while the index for 65% Fe fines lost 8 yuan/wmt to 571 yuan/wmt.

SMM and its new price index business Metals Market Index (MMi) launched the iron ore port indices on May 2 as port prices continued to gain importance in pricing iron ore.

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