In August 2026, the coking coal market demonstrated overall strength, with both futures and spot prices rising sharply. The primary driver of this market trend was a rigid contraction in supply. According to SunSirs' monitoring system, the SunSirs coking coal price index stood at 2,268.75 RMB/tonne as of August 31, marking a 22.88% increase since the beginning of the month.
Regarding upstream supply, production in major domestic producing regions remained low. Following a gas explosion at a coal mine in Qinyuan, Shanxi, on May 22, safety regulations for coal mines nationwide were comprehensively tightened. Although some mines have resumed operations, the general trend has been "resumption of activity without full recovery of volume," with average output recovering to only about 66% of pre-shutdown levels. In August, the average daily output of clean coking coal was approximately 633,000 tonnes, a 20% drop compared to May. By late August, 54 coking coal mines across five major producing cities in Shanxi remained shut down, involving a production capacity of approximately 58.7 million tonnes. On the import front, while coking coal imports totaled 66.87 million tonnes in the first half of the year—a year-on-year increase of 26.6%—the daily number of trucks clearing customs at the Gants Mod port (Mongolia) plummeted from around 1,400 at the start of August to approximately 590 by the latter half of the month, significantly weakening the supply-replenishing capacity of Mongolian coal. Inventories across the entire industry chain continued to decline, with mine-level stocks falling to a five-year low.
Regarding downstream demand, steel mill production maintained strong resilience. Daily hot metal output remained high at around 2.38 million tonnes, and the resumption of blast furnaces that had previously undergone maintenance generated rigid demand for inventory replenishment. Amid expectations of rising prices, steel mills exhibited a "buy on the rise, not on the fall" mentality, leading to an increased willingness to restock. Coking enterprises faced deep losses due to cost pressures—with the average loss per tonne of coke exceeding 190 RMB for independent producers nationwide—forcing them to voluntarily cut production capacity; however, the continued upward pressure on coke prices provided indirect demand support for coking coal. Overall Outlook: In the short term, supply-side constraints are unlikely to ease quickly, given the continuation of safety regulations and limited recovery in customs clearance for Mongolian coal. Meanwhile, blast furnace operating rates at steel mills remain high, providing a solid foundation of underlying demand; amidst a landscape of low inventories across the entire supply chain, prices are more likely to rise than fall. Coking coal supply and demand are expected to remain tight in September, with prices likely to maintain a trend of fluctuating upward. However, in the medium to long term, it is necessary to guard against the risk of negative feedback resulting from continuously shrinking steel mill profits—should hot metal output begin a sustained decline, downward pressure from the demand side will gradually emerge.
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