DAILY: China's met coke prices set to rise as steelmakers yield

After prolonged negotiations for about two weeks, on January 28 Chinese steelmakers finally agreed to pay more in their future metallurgical coke purchases, marking the first price hike victory for coke producers this year, market sources reported.

On Wednesday afternoon, some mills in North China's Hebei and Tianjin, and East China's Shandong accepted a Yuan 50-55/tonne ($7.2-7.9/t) hike in their purchasing prices for all met coke products, effective this Friday. Market analysts expected leading domestic mills to follow suit in their tenders to be issued tomorrow,