Interpac Business and Migration Solutions Melbourne Australia

(January 18,2012)

The Perth-based miner, chaired by Andrew Forrest, yesterday reported it had shipped 14.8 million tonnes of iron ore during the final three months of last year, up 19 per cent on the previous quarter.

Fortescue chief executive Nev Power said the group had continued to place every tonne of iron ore in to the Chinese, Japanese and Korean markets, despite a rough month in October when the price was volatile.

"In China we have seen the inflation control by the central government continue and that has put a credit squeeze on some customers," Mr Power said.

"But in recent times there has been substantial easing of that because the inflation controls have been working.

"We don't expect to see any major change in the short-term and following Chinese New Year we expect to see an uptick in demand."

He said Fortescue received an average price of $US122 a tonne during the quarter, when the price hit a high of $US170 a tonne and a low of $US116 a tonne.

The Pilbara miner added that the steel price remained under pressure in China, which made all of its customers cost sensitive in their operations.

"There were no major changes on the demand side of the market and we see the demand continuing strongly," Mr Power said. "Given that there has not been any significant additional supply coming into the market, the price is likely to be sustained in the $US130 a tonne to $US150 a tonne range for the foreseeable future."

The miner achieved an annualised run rate of 59 million tonnes a year, and says it plans to maintain a 55 million tonne rate for the coming quarter, which covers the traditional wet season and possible cyclones.

Mr Power said it was pleasing to see the operations continuing to perform consistently and hit production targets.

"It has been a very significant quarter for us and while we have seen some price volatility, significantly the price has rebounded to the $US140 a tonne range," he said.

"We have had a brilliant quarter and we continue to fine tune and improve our operational performance in terms of production and costs."

Fortescue also highlighted that its expansion plan to 155 million tonnes per annum remained on budget and on schedule. The company has about $2.5 billion cash and has the funding in place for the expansion program.

"We are continuing to push the boundaries in terms of how quickly we can bring that (expansion) on stream," Mr Power said.

The company says it is still reviewing options to fund the mining fleet required for the ramp-up to 155mtpa, which will need about $US1.5bn ($1.44bn).
（source：theaustralian)