China coal futures extend plunge after signs of govt intervention

BEIJING: China’s thermal coal futures fell the maximum 11% at the start of Wednesday’s night session on the Zhengzhou Commodity Exchange, extending a plunge triggered by possible government intervention in prices 24 hours earlier.

The National Development and Reform Commission (NDRC), China’s state planner, had on Tuesday said it was studying ways to intervene in record-high coal prices, amid a deepening power supply crunch, and would take all necessary measures to bring them back to a “reasonable range.”

The statement alone sent thermal coal down 8% in Tuesday’s night session, which is part of Wednesday’s trading day.

The continued drop on Wednesday night means the price of the most traded thermal coal futures contract is now down almost 20% from the record high of 1,982 yuan a tonne touched on Tuesday. It is still up more than 200% year-to-date amid strong demand for the fuel, China’s main source of power generation.

On the Dalian Commodity Exchange, futures for steelmaking raw materials coking coal and coke dived more than 10% and more than 8%, respectively, at the start of Wednesday’s night session.

The NDRC said on Wednesday it sent teams to two major coal ports, Qinhuangdao and Caofeidian, both in China’s top steelmaking province of Hebei, to supervise coal supply and price stabilisation.

It also sent a team to a coal storage and distribution trader centre in Hebi, in central China’s Henan province, where NDRC officials emphasised the need to crack down and “publicly expose” speculation on the coal spot market, an NDRC statement said.