China's domestic thermal coal prices are bottoming

China's domestic thermal coal prices are bottoming - Platts (Ruth Chen Jonathan Dart) China's domestic thermal prices are bottoming due to increased coal demand and transactions, while local producers like China Coal and Shenhua are not expected to cut production, an analysts' report from UOBKayHian said Tuesday. The report also said that in January-July, China's total coal production fell 3.5% year on year to 2.1 billion mt. China Coal and Shenhua's coal production increased 6% and 2% year-on-year respectively, showing that low cost producers are not cutting production and would continue to gain from increasing their market share. Shenhua's coal sales were down by 27% to 33.1 million mt, compared to its coal production of 26 million mt last month.