Iron ore prices surged last week, jumping back to close to $US65 a tonne for a gain of more than 14% in seven days, and pushing the price well above the $US57.02 level at the end of May.
The Metal Bulletin price rose $US8.20 a tonne for ore delivered to Qingdao in northern China last week to end at $US64.95.
The low for the month was just under $US55 a tonne in mid June, but the end of June price was up 13.8% from the end of May, but still down 18.1% from the end of December level of $US80 a tonne.
Still, iron ore shed close to 20% for the second quarter, after steep losses in April (16.5%) and May.
Shares in BHP Billiton and Rio Tinto closed up 3.9% and 7.6% respectively and Fortescue Metals shares surged more than 12% last week. But for the quarter the shares lost more than 16% and for the year so far, they are down nearly 11.4%.
BHP shares lost 3.3% in June, 3.1% in the quarter and are down 7% from the start of the year. Rio shares did better on top of last week’s surge. For June they were up 0.7%, 4.6% for the quarter, but a solid 5.6% for the six months to June 30.
