China's manganese ore prices hit 4-month low

Mysteel: Manganese ore prices in China lost more ground this week, with the price of South Africa-origin 36.5% grade manganese ore at North China's Tianjin port under Mysteel's assessment sliding to yuan 35.5/dmtu ($5/dmtu) including the 13% VAT as of 7 August, falling by yuan 3/dmtu on week and hitting the lowest since 16 April.

Market participants are not so confident about the prices of manganese ore in the coming term, given the weakness of silicomanganese prices, as more silico manganese smelters may conduct maintenance on their smelting facilities or slow their production pace if they cannot gain profits when selling their output, Mysteel Global learned.

Silico manganese prices in China's physical and futures markets struggled over the past week. On Wednesday, the national price of 6517 silico manganese was assessed by Mysteel at yuan 6,262/t including the 13% VAT, dropping by yuan 212/t from one week before.

In the derivative market, the most-traded silico manganese contract on the Zhengzhou Futures Exchange (ZFE) for delivery in January 2025 closed the daytime trading session on 7 August at yuan 6,580/t, lower by yuan 232/t compared with the settlement price on 31 July, according to the exchange's data.

Transactions involving manganese ore in the physical market have slowed recently, as some silico manganese smelters intend to halt operation after consuming their in-plant manganese ore inventories, given the severe losses they're suffering on silico manganese sales.

The slowdown in sales has led inventories of manganese ore at China's major ports to increase recently. As of 2 August, the tonnage of this ore at the ports totalled 4.97 million tonnes (mnt), higher by 323,000 tonnes (t) or 7% from the prior week, according to Mysteel's latest weekly survey.

Domestic manganese ore prices may remain under pressure for the foreseeable future, as silico manganese smelters may try to cut their buying prices to reduce their smelting costs and to ease their losses if silico manganese prices don't improve, Mysteel Global noted.