Iron Ore news
  • In recent months, a number of macro-economic indicators for China have begun to look up, and this has to be borne in mind.  Industrial production figures show a 12.3% increase y-o-y for August, the fourth consecutive month of acceleration in growth gowth rate. 
 
Coking Coal News
  • On the 19th August came the news that Consol Energy Inc. was shipping 88,000t of metallurgical coal from its Buchanan mine in Virginia to China, one of the first major shipments f coking coal to be mad out of the US to China for many years.  
    Consol stated that it would be interested in providing more gargoes in the future.  The deal between Chinese steelmakers and Consol was made through a Japanese trading company.
  • Yet again China's seaborne coking coal imports reported a record high in July, rising to 4.4mt and exhibiting a growth of 6.6% m-o-m and 4774.4% y-o-y.  Australia remained the number one source, accounting for 73.3% of all imports during the month.  In the first seven months of 2009 China therefore imported 16.omt of coking coal, an increase of 814.6% y-o-y.  China's Canadian sourced coking coal imports have also been on the increase, rising massively from the low reported in January.
  • Exports from Australia's major coking coal export terminal, Dalrymple Bay, eased off slightly in August after reaching a record 6.03mt in July.  Exports totalled 4.67mt for the month, down 22.6% m-o-m, at least partly influenced by total closure of the terminal's rail system.

Steam Coal News
  • After China's dramatic increase in seaborne thermal coal imports in 2009, provisional 2010 imports are expected to slow and contract by around 40% y-o-y.
    As international prices rise, it is expected that domestic production will become a more economically viable option again and China is therefore also provisionally expected to export more steam in 2010 than this year.
  • Export of thermal coal from  Newcastle port on Australia's east coast eased during August 2009 as both Chinese and Japanese demand petered out.
    Higher freight and FOB prices reportedly helped dampen China's appetite for Newcastle thermal coal in August 2009 after record Chinese thermal coal imports in the previous months.  In May 2009 China was the destination for 15.8% of Newcastle's coal exports, bur this fell to stand at 12.7% in June and 9.8% in July and it share reportedly fell further in August.  Sources suggest that Japanese spot enquiry has also been falling, as buyers are reportedly already covered under longterm contracts for the rest of the year and stockpiles remain high.
Grain Trade News
  • Global grain trad is now estimated to have reached 247.6mt in the 2008.09 crop year, yet another increase in the estimate.  However 2009/10 trade is projected lower than last month at 222.2mt.  Trade is therefore set to decrease by 25.4mt y-o-y in the 2009/10 crop year, predominantly due to larger harvests of wheat and barley in Near East Asia than in the previous year.
  • World wheat trade is now projected to reach just 112.5mt in the 2009/10 crop year, a decline of 17.3% (23.5mt) y-o-y.  Higher harvest yields are expected to limit requirement in Morocco and Egypt in particular, imports to the countries declining by 50.1% and 17.2% respectively.
  • Iran looks set to become the largest importer of Kazakhstani wheat detailing Kazakhstan to export 1.5mt of this calender year's wheat to Iran.  A grain regulatory body reported that it expects around 2-2.5mt of the country's wheat to be sold to central Asian countries and Afghanistan in 2009.
Grain Export News
  • The shortfall in Argentinean soybean exports (owing to the country's worst droughts for 70 years) looks to be being at least partly made up for by record Brazilian exports/  Exports in Jully remained very high in comparison to previous years, standing at 3.6mt.  The recent substantial decline in Argentinian soybean exports has however lead to a significant shortfall in overall South American soybean supplies and as a consequence, the US is likely to be the dominant supplier in the first half of 2009/10 crop year (October-September).