Coalspur should be trading at over $1 with the latest coal prices. I think most coal stocks will head too new highs this week.
By Fayen Wong PERTH, April 27 (Reuters) - Australia's thermal coal prices, a benchmark for Asia, jumped 9 percent from a week ago to an 18-month high on Tuesday, boosted by threats of a supply disruption in South Africa, with some analysts expecting prices to continue their upward trend on renewed Chinese demand. Conflicting reports on possible strike action at the Richards Bay Coal Terminal in South Africa, key supplier to Europe and India, comes at a time when other Asian utilities are boosting coal purchases before the summer power demand -- stoking concerns of tighter regional supplies if European and Indian end-users looked eastwards for their coal needs. Prices for Australian thermal coal free-on-board Newcastle port jumped $9.28 from a week ago to $108 a tonne on Tuesday on screen platform globalCOAL, the highest since October 2008. Supply jitters prompted coal prices in South Africa's Richards Bay port to surge by $3-$5 to trade twice at $100 a tonne on Monday. [ID:nLDE63P14X] Buyers in India, which is expected to boost its thermal coal imports by 75 percent to 35 million tonnes in 2010, have already increased their orders from Indonesia as most South African producers have already been booked out this year, traders said. Chinese buyers were also actively seeking imports and have inked large volumes with Indonesian and Columbian sellers for thermal coal to be delivered in the second-half, sources said. "Prices could still go higher from here. We're beginning to see very strong demand from China and India and we are expecting shortfall of between 10-20 million tonnes in the Asian thermal coal market this year," said Andreas Bokkenheuser, a coal analyst at UBS Bank in Singapore. Analysts said the 47 percent increase in the latest term price settlement between Chinese coal producers and Japanese buyers of $115.50 a tonne was also a sign of market bullishness.
CPL Price at posting:
86.5¢ Sentiment: Buy Disclosure: Held
(20min delay)