They paid out too much dividends in June 2023, distributed in...

They paid out too much dividends in June 2023, distributed in Sep 23 quarter. They paid c$25-30m tax bill for the FY23 high earning, but with lower cash flow from Q2 profit. Hence the reduction in cash held despite two consecutive quarters of no dividends.The bright side is they now managed to reduce cost of production which was a blow out $128/tonne in Q1 to $115/tonne, and with no dividend from Q2 and no tax bill, they have really no reason not to declare a dividend in Q3/Q4.

The million dollar question is obviously where commodity coal prices will go. With the energy crisis of 2022 far behind us, is there structural support for coal prices to maintain average say $150/ tonne for the next decade (a far cry from the peak $430/tonne in late 2022). My opinion is that a spike in prices of that magnitude is not possible without at least some support from an economic cycle perspective. Without the Ukraine energy crisis it might not have peaked at $430 but the crisis merely exaggerated and brought forward a longer term shift in the coal market after a decade of low margins.