Pilbara killer goes berserk

Tuesday 3 November 2026

Iron ore has been holding for a few days, but the free fall in HRC is a bad omen.

My freight-adjusted CFR estimate is hovering around $83.

Simandou is going berserk. In mid-October, it shipped a record 1.58mt in a single week. October itself is on track for about 5.5mt.

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About the author

David Llewellyn-Smith is Chief Strategist at the MB Fund and MB Super. David is the founding publisher and editor of MacroBusiness and was the founding publisher and global economy editor of The Diplomat, the Asia Pacific’s leading geo-politics and economics portal. He is also a former gold trader and economic commentator at The Sydney Morning Herald, The Age, the ABC and Business Spectator. He is the co-author of The Great Crash of 2008 with Ross Garnaut and was the editor of the second Garnaut Climate Change Review.