BEIJING - Dalian iron ore closed lower on Tuesday after major iron ore miners in Australia resumed some operations after cyclones, easing concerns over tight supply of the steel-making ingredient.
Rio Tinto said that staff were returning to its iron ore ports and rail operations in Western Australian, while BHP Group expects to restart loading ships on Tuesday with production ramping up over the next few days.
That helped to relieve supply tension as a Brazilian court on Monday ordered several tailing dams owned by Vale SA to halt businesses.
Operations at some 13 dams will be paralysed, and as a result, productions at Vale's major Brucutu mines, with annual capacity of 30-million tonnes of iron ore, will take longer than expected to come back on line.
The Brazilian miner did not give a specific timeline of the restart of Brucutu.
The most-active iron ore futures on the Dalian Commodity Exchange dipped 0.8% to 609 yuan ($90.75) a tonne when market closed at 0700 GMT.
Inventory of the steel-making raw materials, however, continued to pile up last week as of March 22 to 148.6-million tonnes, according to data tracked by SteelHome, as steel mills have not fully resumed their operations from production restrictions.
Meanwhile, steel prices continued to fall amid persistent concerns over global economic slowdown and the uncertain trade talks between Beijing and Washington scheduled later this week.
The benchmark Shanghai construction steel rebar contract fell 0.7% to 3 705 yuan a tonne, while hot-rolled coil futures finished 0.7% lower to 3 662 yuan.