Let the sharp drop in imports of iron ore in China in October and looks suspicious, it should still be considered in light of the record level of the previous month and the holiday week.
Preliminary data on imports of goods, published on Wednesday by the General Administration of Customs of China, showed that the import of iron ore in October fell to 79.5 million tons, which is 22.7 percent less than September's 102.8 million tons.
Imports in October were the weakest since February 2016, which raised market concerns about the fact that the reduction in steel production in China in the winter, aimed at reducing pollution, was much more rapid than originally thought.
But while iron ore imports may fall slightly in the coming months, the October recession and the September record are better to be considered in general, rather than as two separate months.
Most likely the matter is that a week-long weekend in early October caused a "transfer" of iron ore supplies in September, increasing its performance at the expense of October.
The combination of two months gives a total of 182.3 million tons, or an average of 91.2 million tons per month.
This is even slightly higher than the average monthly 89.6 million tons for the first 10 months of 2017, which indicates that the "September-October tandem" was hardly weak.
The risk is that the shock indicator of October is overly interpreted by market participants, when in fact it is nothing more than a statistical anomaly.
In general, the October data on commodity trade in China should be viewed with caution, coupled with the November indicators, which are likely to provide a clearer picture of the scale of any decline.
