Wednesday, August 26, 2009
July coal imports fell 14% MoM
Tuesday, 25 August 2009
China Customs annouced on August 24 that China imported 13.88mln tons of coal in July, down 14% than June. But compared to monthly 3.4mln tons on average last year, the coal imports of July 2009 are still at the high level. The customs data showed that China's coking coal imports in July rose by 6% to 4.9mln tons, surpassing one third of the total coal imports.
From February 2009 to now, China's coal posted the net import for the consecutive six months, the imports in July were 13.88mln tons, more than 3 times as the import in the same month last year. During the January-July period of 2009, the total coal imports were 62.16mln tons, up 1.5 times year on year.
In the meantime, coal exports sharply shrank, the exports in July being only 12.4mln tons, a reduction of 35.3mln tons year on year, down 74%, which was the seven times that the imports were lower than 2mln tons since 2000. In the January-July period, the accumulative coal exports were 12.92mln tons, down 57.3% over the same period last year.
Experts noted that the imports in July had a shrinkage in comparison with June. It is expected that in those months of the second half year, coal imports will significantly decline, and the imports peak has passed. Because the domestic crude coal production will remain the rapidly increasing trend, the coal imports still keep at the high level, the summer peak comes to an end, the coal market will enter the consumption dull-season, the oversupply of coal market will further serious, the market price may decrease.
Source: MetalBiz
