India’s metallurgical coke import prices continue to rise on the back of limited availability of spot cargoes as a result of increased import demand from China.
- Seaborne spot metcoke supply remains limited
- Buying interest from China firm on stronger steel prices
China’s domestic met coke supplies have tightened after widespread replacement and reduction of outdated coking capacities, while higher levels of steel production have boosted demand for blast furnace coke and prices within China.
The resultant stronger Chinese import demand for met coke has created availability tightness in the wider Asian seaborne metcoke market, giving rise to coking plants’ willingness to push up prices.
CoalMint currently assesses the spot blast furnace metcoke price for the 64% CSR grade at $309/t CNF India, up $5/t from 4th Nov.
The 62% CSR BF grade metcoke is currently assessed at $305/t CNF India — also up by $5/t from 4th Nov.
Indian met coke import demand buoyed by resurgence of steel production levels
The Indian spot demand for imported metcoke has remained stable amidst the steady recovery in demand growth from the domestic steelmaking industry.
Most of the country’s largest steel producers have scaled back their blast furnace production operations to optimum capacity levels in the current quarter after the lifting of lockdown measures.
Declining coking coal prices increase viability of domestic cokemakers in India
In light of the current Chinese import restrictions on Australian coals, sellers have offered increasing discount levels for ex-Chinese end users to offload their Australian coking coal cargoes into major markets outside of China — mainly including India among others.
Accordingly, Indian coking coal import prices have fallen sharply to attractive levels luring domestic cokeries to opt for seaborne coking coal in order to reduce met coke production costs.
Latest offers for Australian premium hard coking coal are assessed at around $ 113/t on CNF India basis, with average spot prices having slumped by over 22% from a month earlier.
Meanwhile, India’s domestically produced metallurgical coke prices have remained unchanged for the past few weeks, supported by stable demand from the domestic steelmakers.
Indian domestic met coke prices of the 25-90 mm, blast furnace grade are currently assessed at around INR 23,000/t (east coast) and INR 23,500/t (west coast).
India Coal Import Vessel Lineup
CoalMint’s latest vessel lineup data (as on 9 Nov’20) reveals that an aggregate shipment volume of 140,852 t of imported met coke has arrived at different Indian ports last week – 49,482 t at Vizag, 44,000 t at Krishnapatnam port, 24,370 t at Haldia and 23,000 at Paradip.
These inbound met coke consignments have been sourced from different originating countries, viz. China (21,982), Colombia (23,000), Indonesia (27,500 t) and Poland (68,370 t).
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By Aditya Sinha
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