Singapore, 6 January 2012

Platts, one of the world’s foremost providers of energy, petrochemicals and metals information, today expanded its suite of price assessments for steel and steel-related products to include high-grade manganese ore. The new assessment augments Platts’ full range of steel assessments which span from raw material inputs to semi-finished and finished products and freight.

“After working closely with the industry and other market participants for more than a year, Platts is proud to be introducing the world’s first-ever daily assessment of this important commodity,” says Karen McBeth, Editorial Director in Platts Metals Group. “Now the marketplace has an independent source of daily manganese prices reflecting values determined between buyer and seller in the open physical markets and published with a frequency that allows capture of more immediate developments such as short-term changes in supply and demand.”

Manganese ore is used in the making of ferromanganese, silicomanganese and electrolytic manganese -- manganese metal in its purest form -- all of which go into the manufacturing of steel. While steel accounts for about 90% of the world's manganese consumption, the commodity is also used in the alloying of aluminum, various chemical applications, drinking water treatments and dietary supplements.

Known as Platts Manganese Ore CFR China, the new assessment is based on all-day market monitoring and reflects the open market spot value at the close of the Asian/Australian physical market trading day at 1830 Singapore time. Expressed in U.S. dollars per dry metric ton unit (dmtu) and normalized to 44% content grade of manganese lump ore, the assessment reflects cost and freight (CFR) as delivered to Tianjin, China.

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The daily manganese ore assessment is published in Platts Metals Alert, Platts Metals Week and its Metals Daily supplement, as well as Platts Market Data. The price assessment methodology used by Platts in manganese ore, steel, scrap and iron ore has been developed in consultation with a cross section of key industry players, draws upon Platts’ century of experience in benchmark price reporting in the energy markets and is underpinned by robust quality guidelines. Details of the Platts price assessment methodology and specifications are available on the Platts website www.platts.com

For more information on metals, visit Platts website