Iron ore price to hit 35 U.S. dollars per tonne: Australian treasurer

Australian Treasurer Joe Hockey predicted on Monday iron ore prices will continue to tumble to as low as 35 U.S. dollars per tonne.

Currently trading 47.53 U.S. dollars per tonne, the iron ore price has tumbled by 45 percent in the past 13 months.

Hockey, due to deliver his annual budget next month, said he had factored a price of 35 U.S. dollars into it and that the government would lose 25 billion Australian dollars (19.15 billion U.S. dollars) over the next four years.

"There seems to be no floor," Hockey told Fairfax Media.

"We are contemplating as low as 35 U.S. dollars a tonne."

But the government would not punish voters with higher taxes to make up for the revenue shortfall, he said in a later interview with the Australian Broadcasting Corporation on Monday.

"There's no doubt it has an impact on our budget because iron ore has been our biggest export," Hockey said.

"But we are not going to chase the fall in revenue associated with falling iron ore prices down.

"We're not going to be imposing new taxes in order to try and recover that lost revenue." Endi