China’s new iron ore buyer sets off biggest shakeup in yearsBloomberg News | December 16, 2022 | 8:21 am Intelligence China Iron Ore
https://www.mining.com/web/chinas-new-iron-ore-buyer-sets-off-biggest-shakeup-in-years/I particularly like this section...especially the last quote;
"...There was no fanfare when CMRG was established in July, but people familiar with the matter told Bloomberg at the time that its creation was encouraged and closely monitored by top leaders in Beijing. They see a consolidated platform for buying resources as a way to strengthen the country’s negotiating position in an unfriendly international environment.
Despite that, CMRG received little global attention so far. BHP, Vale and Rio’s executives have made few public comments about the company, mostly restricted to recent posts on Chinese social media pledging to work with the new venture. Analysts and investors haven’t seemed overly interested either — it didn’t come up at all in questions during a Rio Tinto investor day last month.
The fact that iron ore supply is so concentrated may limit CMRG’s negotiating power for now, said David Lennox, a resource analyst at Sydney-based Fat Prophets.
“It will only work when there are significant supply sources available for the single buyer to play off against each other, and that is well down the track.” "
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That last line..."well down the track" needs to be more defined. In 10 years, I'd expect China to be acquiring 30-40% of its raw mineral resource demand from Africa alone, putting major pressure on current Australian suppliers. CMRG is real, and AustSino and its partners stand to benefit.
I'm looking forward to more detail on the scope of the 'West Africa Project'.
GLTAH
