China uses trading platform as price lever

Iron Oxide Pigments Mfrs & Supplier For Orders,Contact Three Ring China

"BHP Billiton, together with other industry participants, is supporting initiatives like Global Ore" ... Samantha Stevens, BHP Billiton. Photo: Nic Walker

CHINA has launched a rival iron ore trading platform to strengthen its bargaining power over ore prices with Australian miners, including BHP Billiton and Rio Tinto.

Its new exchange is the latest attempt by Australia's biggest iron ore export market to influence global iron ore prices, which remain at record highs.

The state-sponsored China Iron and Steel Association, together with the China Beijing International Mining Exchange, launched the online trading platform yesterday in competition with the trading platform preferred by international miners, Global Ore.

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BHP Billiton spokeswoman Samantha Stevens said her company supported its Chinese customers' decision, which she said endorsed the principles of transparency and the market pricing mechanism, but reiterated the mining giant's support for Global Ore.

''BHP Billiton, together with other industry participants, is supporting initiatives like Global Ore, a global trading platform that will be launched in a joint effort between consumers, traders and suppliers to further improve transparency for all global participants in the international iron ore markets,'' she said.

Twenty-six major Chinese steel mills and traders including Baosteel, Wuhan Iron and Steel, China Minmetals and Sinosteel have joined the Beijing platform as members, casting doubt on whether important Chinese buyers will support the BHP Billiton-backed trading platform.

Yesterday, the vice-chairman of China Iron and Steel Association, Wang Xiaoqi, said: ''We are still studying the platform [Global Ore]. Chinese steel mills can approach and communicate with it now but shouldn't join it as members.''

It is also reported that none of the major foreign iron ore suppliers have signed on to the Chinese-backed platform. Mysteel analyst Gao Bo said that he believed the BHP Billiton-backed Global Ore was more likely to be accepted by the market.

''Global Ore is likely to be the new international pricing mechanism,'' he told Caixin Media. ''I believe it will be one of the principal trading platforms in the market by the second half of this year.''

China has long resented the dominance of international miners in the global iron ore trade, in which it is the largest consumer.

BHP Billiton and Rio Tinto, together with Brazilian company Vale, control three-quarters of the global seaborne iron ore trade.

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