Reportedly, Russia’s mining IRC Ltd stated yesterday that the company has received US$340 million of loans, which will be used in the development of iron ore projects in the border of Russia and China, from Industrial and Commercial Bank of China (ICBC).

It’s known that IRC Ltd has strived to receive loans from ICBC. The duo singed cooperation memorandum in this March. Under the agreement, ICBC will offer US$2.1 billion of financial bonds to IRC Ltd, including the current US$340 million of loans.

The storage of iron ore in the border of Russia and China is predicted to reach 741 million tons. The company estimates to put the project into operation in 2013 and the annual output of fine iron powder would be at 3.2 million tons.

At present, IRC Ltd owns an iron ore program which has run into operation with annual production capacity of 1 million tons of fine iron powder, sold to China’s Jianlong Group through railway.

According to the saying of CEO of IRC Ltd, the company’s current prices of iron ore to Jianlong Group have been lower than that from Australia, Brazil and India. Thus, it’s expected that the production costs of fine iron power would be lower than US$40/ton after the program is commissioned.