With stockpiles increasingly used as China gets closer to peak winter energy consumption, Shenhua hit 46.7Mt of coal sales in October, which was a 15% gain year on year.
About 2.5Mt of it came from imported coal – a 212.5% increase year on year.
Chinese coal producers had been heavily discounting in August to acquire market share from smaller, high-cost producers, but the trend has reversed recently, adding support to seaborne thermal coal prices, says the ANZ Bank.
“Seaborne thermal coal prices were broadly unchanged while key Chinese producers, including Shenhua, raised their product prices again,” ANZ said.