China's iron ore, steel futures slip after fall in industrial profits

Chinese iron ore and steel futures fell on Monday after industrial firms' profits contracted again in March, highlighting how the world's second biggest economy is yet to recover from the coronavirus crisis.

Profits earned by China's industrial firms fell 34.9% in March from a year earlier, data from the National Bureau of Statistics showed on Monday.

In the first quarter, industrial profits dropped 36.7%, while profits at ferrous metals smelting and processing firms slumped 55.7% on an annual basis.

The most active iron ore futures on the Dalian Commodity Exchange, for September delivery, fell as much as 1.1% to 601 yuan ($84.92) per tonne before closing 0.8% lower at 602 yuan.

Steel rebar on the Shanghai Futures Exchange for October delivery dropped 0.5% to 3,316 yuan a tonne.

Hot-rolled coil, mainly used in cars and home appliances, dipped 0.3% to 3,171 yuan a tonne.

Other steelmaking raw materials were mixed, with Dalian coking coal down 1.7% at 1,075 yuan a tonne while Dalian coke gained 0.3% to 1,702 per tonne.

June stainless steel futures fell 0.5% to 12,915 yuan a tonne.

Some 2.97 million people have been reported to be infected by the novel coronavirus globally and 205,948 have died, according to a Reuters tally.

Port inventories of seaborne iron ore across China stood at 117.95 million tonnes as of April 24, the lowest level since July 14, 2019, data tracked by SteelHome consultancy showed.

Spot prices of ore with 62% iron content for delivery to China were unchanged at $84.5 per tonne from the previous session on Friday.

Fitch Ratings said it expects the coronavirus impact on China steelmakers to ease and predicted market fundamentals to improve in the second quarter as the economic disruptions from the outbreak wane.

China's local governments have received the go-ahead to issue another 1 trillion yuan ($141.37 billion) in special bonds, the financial magazine Yicai reported on Monday, citing local government sources, adding that they were urged to use up the quota by the end of May.