Steel Strip

Iron ore contract price talks have broken down after Baoshan Iron & Steel Co Ltd (Baosteel), China’s biggest steelmaker, said it and its peers consider price demands by the world’s three biggest ore producers "far too high," the Australian Financial Review reported.

Each year around this time, the world’s three largest miners — Anglo-Australian groups BHP Billiton and Rio Tinto and Brazil’s CVRD — sit down with a Chinese representative to hammer out annual contract prices for iron ore imports.
In 2006, China was the world’s first major producer to settle with the three miners, agreeing to a relatively modest hike of 9.5 pct for the year starting April 2007, following a 19 pct rise in 2006 and a 71.5 pct spike in 2005.

Financial analysts are forecasting that China will have to pay a lot more from April the 1st year, estimates vary from 35% to 100% increase.