The anthracite coal market in India has been lackluster since long time because of inconspicuous consumption within the country’s end-user markets. Accordingly, Indian anthracite import has remained at significantly low levels due to the consistent prevalence of sluggish demand, primarily attributable to alternate cheaper coal types being used across industries.
Interestingly however, there was a substantial improvement in the domestic demand for anthracite coal over the last month with certain Indian buyers having procured considerable quantities of the material during the month.
Remarkably, anthracite coal imports in India rose by 600% in Apr’18 to 215,079 MT against 30,010 MT in Mar’18, notably registering the highest shipment volume since CY13.
Further, the country’s imports during the previous fiscal were up by 30% Y-o-Y, totaling around 1.21 MnT in FY18 against the lower imports of around 0.93 MnT in FY17.
Nevertheless the surge in the country’s import volumes last month can be projected to be merely a seasonal one-off effect; happening primarily on account of industrial traders having actively ramped up their coal purchases in order to stock the raw material ahead of the monsoons.
Even then, India imported a meager quantity of around 8,400 MT of the coal during the 1-10 May’18 period, as per the data compiled by CoalMint Research.
On the pricing front, latest anthracite coal offers to India linger at around USD 136/MT FoB, which translates into around USD 149/MT CFR India; unaltered from the week-ago assessment.
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