Seasonal demand lull slows China's met coke market

After tough negotiations, two leading steelmakers in North China's Hebei and East China's Shandong provinces bowed to the demands of independent producers of metallurgical coke this week and finally agreed to pay Yuan 50-55/tonne ($6.9-7.6/t) extra for the feed material on Wednesday.

The mills' concession on higher coke prices came as a surprise to most market players when the likelihood of a softening coke market had been increasing, Mysteel Global notes. Industry chatter suggests the steelmakers conceded to encourage coke deliveries to their works as their inventories were running low. Indeed, coke