China Baosteel President Says Iron Ore Price Talks Continuing
July 08 2009 - 6:59AM
Dow Jones News
China is still negotiating 2009-10 iron ore contract prices with
key iron ore suppliers and hasn't reached an agreement yet,
Baosteel Group President Xu Lejiang said Wednesday.
"We are still talking (with the miners), under the guidance from
China Iron & Steel Association," Xu said on the sideline of a
business event in Shanghai.
Separately, Rio Tinto Plc (RTP) spokesman in London, Nick
Cobban, also said price talks were still continuing. Cobban
declined to elaborate.
The comments were made after the China Business News website
reported earlier in the day that Chinese companies had finally
agreed to the same 33% price cut for iron ore fines that was
earlier agreed with Japanese and South Korean steel mills.
Chinese negotiators have been holding out for a deeper price cut
this year.
The China Business News report, citing unnamed sources, had said
the deal was struck for a six-month period from April and that
talks were still on to decide prices for the second half of the
contract year.
Baosteel, China's biggest steel producer by output, along with
the China Iron & Steel Association, has been representing
Chinese steel mills in this year's annual price negotiations with
Brazilian miner Vale S.A. (VALE) and Anglo-Australian miners Rio
Tinto and BHP Billiton Ltd. (BHP).
A BHP spokeswoman, when contacted, also said price talks were
still going on.
"We will make an announcement when the majority of our contracts
have been settled," she said.
-Andrea Hotter in London and Li Yue in Shanghai contributed to
this report; Dow Jones Newswires; 8610 6588 5848;
Yue.li@dowjones.com