China now main benchmark for coke prices-CIS conference

During his speech on November 15 at the CIS Raw Materials conference in Moscow, Andrew Jones of Resource-net stated that Chinese prices have become the main benchmark for worldwide coke prices. According to Jones, the Chinese government is likely to keep the export limit for coke and coal at 14 million tons in 2007 - i.e. at the same level as the last two years - as part of their policy to discourage over-production and control pollution. Jones also added that, coal prices being exceptionally high compared to merchant coke prices, it should be cheaper for steelmaking companies to import coke from China or other sources than to produce coke captively. He said the prices are likely to go down further following the 10% slide in 2006.