Newcastle thermal coal futures for the April contract on the ICE closed at $192.75/t, slightly strengthening by 0.39%, with the positive sentiment barely outstripping the negative.

This came after a 1.54% fall a day earlier, adding to the wave trajectory since Feb 10 in a narrow range of $174-206/t.

The positive sentiment mainly came from China and rising natural gas prices. China was reported to continue to increase coal purchases from abroad, with seaborne thermal coal imports touching 26.82 million tonnes in March, Kpler data showed. This would be the highest in Kpler records going back to January 2017,  41% higher than February and 70% higher than the year-ago level.

Additionally, the strengthening of natural gas prices in Europe due to projected colder temperatures in the next few weeks has also helped the coal market.

European natural gas prices EU Dutch TTF (EUR) strengthened 0.12% on the day and 7.1% on the week to 42.8 euros/MWh on March 29.

On the other hand, negative sentiment came from the United States and India. The U.S. Energy Information Agency reported the contribution of coal plants to US electricity production is continuing to decline, with electricity production from renewable sources outperforming coal for the first time in history.

The U.S. power generation totaled 4.09 TWh in 2022, with coal contributing 20%, down from 23% in 2021, while wind, solar and hydropower contributed 21%, up from 19% a year earlier.

India, the world's second largest coal importer, is targeting to export thermal coal by the fiscal 2025-26, said its coal minister Pralhad Joshi on March 29.

The minister said India's imports of substitutable coal were 90 million tonnes, which will be stopped by 2025-26 when the country will start exporting the fuel.

(Writing by Alex Guo  Editing by Harry Huo)
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