WEEKLY: China's coking coal trading gathers pace as optimism builds

China's spot coking coal transactions accelerated during the past week, consolidating the momentum seen gathering since January 7. Both optimistic sentiment and stabilizing downstream sectors fueled an increased buying appetite among market participants.

Speculative purchases, mainly made by coal traders and washeries, first drove the market's rally, supported by sharp gains in domestic coking coal futures prices. After observing signs of market stabilization, some coke producers and steelmakers also ramped up their replenishments of the feed coal last week, according to market