Some Chinese steel mills have agreed to provisional prices for iron ore, executives from three Chinese steel companies said Wednesday.

An official at Hebei Iron and Steel Group said his mill has reached a tentative price of a 33% discount from last year's benchmark rate with both Rio Tinto PLC (RTP) and BHP Billiton Ltd. (BHP).

"We're still waiting to hear from the China Iron and Steel Association and Baosteel Group Corp. on the final inked iron ore price," said the Hebei official, who declined to be identified. "And after that, we'll pay the price difference to ore miners."

A provisional price doesn't mean a final term price agreement for the 2009-2010 contract year. Steel mills and suppliers are still in talks for a final pricing agreement. All shipments after April 1 have been under provisional prices of about 60%-80% of last year's price.

Hu Kai, an analyst at Umetal, who is in close contact with miners and mills, said many mills, including Baosteel, Shougang Group, Anshan Iron and Steel Group, have reached such provisional agreements for a 33% discount.

Hu said the provisional deals were struck with Rio. He said he was unaware of deals struck with BHP.

-Yue Li, Juan Chen and Chuin-Wei Yap contributed to this story, Dow Jones Newswires; 8610 6588 5848; chuin-wei.yap@dowjones.com