You’re on to it! Does anyone remember the game in the early...

You’re on to it! Does anyone remember the game in the early nineties when the Chinese played with the Australian wool market? They pushed the wool price up 150% over a couple of years. Farmers scrambled to breed as many sheep as possible only to be caught with wool they could not sell as the Chinese dropped out of the market because they had stockpiles of wool. The reserve wool scheme paid the reserve price for while but soon realized that they were in serious trouble and the scheme collapsed. We had millions of bales of wool that we could not sell and hefty storage costs. They have purchased our wool for the past 17 years with massive control over the price they will pay, which would be equivalent to the prices of wool back in the early eighties.
I see a very similar strategy taking place with the iron ore market at the moment. They have stockpiled, we have invested millions of dollars into infrastructure, massive commitments and will probably find ourselves somewhat powerless to negotiate prices in the future. My opinion only, though I would be interested to read other view points.