The high real part of permittivity (34 similar to 63), resonant permittivity and antiresonant permeability were observed simultaneously in flake-shaped cobalt microcrystal powders embedded in the wax composite in 2-16 GHz. frequency range. These cobalt flakes are assembled structure composed of cobalt nano-crystalline. The estimated crystallite size of cobalt nanocrystalline is 25 nm. The scattering of complex permittivity at mkrowave frequency was thoroughly discussed in this paper and the antiresonant permeability behavior was explained using Mie theory and electromagnetic induction principle. The magnetic hysteresis loops of the pressed disk using cobalt powders revealed that the sample exhibited ferromagnetic characteristics with a saturation magnetization of 149 emu/g and a coercivity of 263 Oe at room temperature. The reflection loss of cobalt/wax composite with 60 wt % cobalt reaches a minimum of -12.2 dB at 11.2 GHz and the bandwidth less than -6 dB covering 9.28-13.04 GHz range with the coating thickness only 1 mm. In addition, the absorption peak sites can be adjusted easily by varying the coating thickness. The excellent microwave absorption properties in 2-16 GHz range can attribute to strong dielectric loss and relative high permeability coming from strong magnetic anisotropy. (C) 2015 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.