Platts revises moisture levels for iron ore fines netback calculations

Platts, part of S&P Global Commodity Insights, has revised the implied moisture levels used in deriving the FOB netback calculations for various freight routes and vessel classes from their respective CFR China price assessments, effective July 1.

The revisions apply updated moisture content levels for iron ore fines in the wet-to-dry mt conversions of the freight rates, used in netting back the CFR China iron ore prices to an FOB basis.

The FOB netback calculations result from deducting Platts dry bulk freight rate assessments from Platts daily seaborne assessments for 62% Fe, 58% Fe and 65% Fe iron ore fines on a CFR Qingdao, China basis.

Platts first published a proposal to revise moisture levels(opens in a new tab) for iron ore fines netback calculations on April 1.

Following market feedback, Platts communicated its decision to implement the changes(opens in a new tab) on June 2.

Platts has revised the moisture content levels as follows:

In addition, Platts has updated the fixed pages PMA1106 and STL1106 of its real-time alerts services to remove shipping routes that do not have a corresponding FOB netback calculation:

The moisture levels for the netback calculations for other delivery routes remain unchanged.

Full details of the assessments can be found in the Platts Iron Ore Specifications Guide(opens in a new tab).

Details of the iron ore freight rate assessments can be found in Platts Global Freight Specifications Guide(opens in a new tab).

The assessments and their associated monthly averages are published in the real-time Platts Metals Alert and Platts Steel Alert, in SBB Steel Markets Daily and in the Platts price database. The assessments are included on pages PMA1106 and STL1106, and the monthly averages are on pages PMA1160 and STL1160.

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