The present invention relates to a metal powder mixture that is suitable for producing sintered bodies. The powder mixture is suitable as a binder for hard metals and contains: a) at least one prealloyed powder selected from the group of iron/nickel, iron/cobalt, iron/nickel/cobalt and nickel/cobalt; b) at least one element powder selected from the group of iron, nickel and cobalt or a prealloyed powder selected from the group consisting of iron/nickel, iron/cobalt, iron/nickel/cobalt and nickel/cobalt which is different from component a). The invention also relates to a cemented hard material which uses the inventive powder mixture and a hard material powder, wherein the overall composition of the components a) and b) together contains not more than 90% by weight of cobalt and not more than 70% by weight of nickel and the iron content.