Russia’s largest coal supplier and Japanese utilities have reached an agreement on a thermal coal import contract at around US$72 per t for the financial year starting 1 April. This figure is 17% lower than the previous fiscal year.
The deal with SUEK Plc was most probably based on the earlier coal contract settlements between Tohoku Electric Power and global mining groups Rio Tinto and Glencore Xstrata at just under US$68 a t, also down 17% on year.
Japanese utilities are purchasing more coal from Russia to expand their purchasing sources as they currently rely on Australia for about 74% of their total imports.
Japan imported 9.69 million t of thermal coal from Russia last year, up 23.5% from 2013 and accounting for nearly 9% of total thermal coal imports.
Edited from source by Joseph Green. Source: Reuters