India: Entire Quantity Booked in NMDC's Recent Karnataka Iron Ore E-auction

India's largest iron ore miner - National Mineral Development Corporation (NMDC) had scheduled iron ore e-auction from its Karnataka mines on 10th April'20. The total quantity put up for auction was 400,000 MT out of which entire quantity got booked. The miner had lowered base price by upto INR 500/MT for Apr'20.

As per the sources, all the material offered was sold out at base prices. Iron ore lumps (Fe 62.5%) offered from Kumarswamy mines received a bid at INR 2,870/MT (Ex-mines, Royalty, DMF, and NMET excluded).

In another lot put up for auction of fines (Fe 61%) was booked at INR 1,959/MT (Ex-mines, Royalty, DMF, and NMET excluded).

JSW Steel turned out to be the largest buyer in the auction with 380,000 MT iron ore being booked. Out of the total quantity booked, 268,000 MT fines and 112,000 lumps. Other buyers in the auction were Srikalahasthi Pipes Limited 12,000 MT iron ore (8,000 MT lumps and 4,000 MT fines) and BMM Ispat Ltd with 8,000 MT fines.

According to e-auction data compiled by SteelMint, NMDC sold 6.96 MnT iron ore via Karnataka e-auctions in FY20, down by 25% Y-o-Y against last fiscal year at 9.23 MnT. With operations remaining on hold in Donimalai, all the sales made were from its Kumaraswamy mines.