Rio Tinto announced a 9% decline in the first quarter iron ore shipment on Wednesday. 2025 Pilbara shipments are now expected to be at the lower end after tropical cyclones ravaged Australia's West Coast and disrupted operation.

Rio Tinto's shipments were affected by the series of tropical storms that hit the Pilbara in the first quarter.

The company warned earlier that it would lose 13 million metric tonnes of iron ore as a result of bad weather.

In the three-month period ending March 31, the world's biggest iron ore producer, which is based in Pilbara, shipped 70.7 Mt of the steelmaking material. This was down from the 78Mt it had shipped in the same time last year.

This was below the Visible Alpha consensus of 73.6 Mt. Reporting by Roushni Mukherjee & Rajasik Mukherjee from Bengaluru, Editing by Devika Syamnath

(source: Reuters)