The China versus India position is probably the best example of the challenge confronting anyone trying to predict the future direction of coal, up or down, but last week threw up several other conflicting signals worth consideration.

New Hope Corporation, one of the more successful Australian coal companies, revealed that it was starting to think about expansion via acquisition – a position which sits in contrast to one of those boringly predictable warnings from a green-leaning research group about slowing Chinese coal demand.

Another critical report on the big coal trader Noble Group by an anonymous analyst writing under the Iceberg banner, was followed by Noble punching back much harder than when two earlier critical reports were published by a person who appears to be a disgruntled former employee.

Concern about China’s growth rate was offset by a report from the Asian Development Bank which forecast that India is overtaking China in the Asian growth race for the first time in decades.

The India versus China situation is also being played out in Australia on a number of levels, one of which The Hog explored last week with thoughts about how the way had been cleared for expansion of Queensland’s Abbott Point port to handle coal shipments from the Indian-backed Carmichael and Alpha projects in the Galilee Basin.

The point about rattling off a list of positives and negatives is that while conditions are still tough in the coal industry it might now be safe to say that they do not appear to be getting any worse.

The next few months will reveal whether the rot has stopped and recovery started thanks to production cuts eating into supply and steady, though not strong, demand ensuring a reliable market for what is being mined.

More good news is required to claim that the worst of the downturn has passed though it is worth considering the quality of recent events and while that requires a subjective (rather than objective) assessment it is The Hog’ view that the quality of the positives are starting to outweigh the negatives.

Take New Hope’s expansion plans as a case study. Until recently no one was taking about increasing their exposure to coal because prices were so low and the outlook so bleak.

New Hope, a thermal-coal specialist, is singing a different tune with inquiries beginning into how it can acquire distressed assets from companies drowning in debt, or mismanaged in some other way, with the closest attention reserved for an expanded interest in metallurgical coal.

Armed with $1.1 billion in spare cash New Hope is a rare beast in that it can go on the takeover offensive, which is not what the critics of coal would expect, such as those behind the latest report from the curiously named Institute of Energy Economics and Financial Analysis who have never had a positive word to say about coal despite it being the world’s low-cost, go-to, energy source.

The latest views from that Institute seized on China’s slowing demand for coal but deftly overlooked the rising demand in India, and the fact that the Asian Development Bank is forecasting Indian economic growth of 7.8% next financial year, and 8.2% in the year after versus 7.2% for China next year and 7% in the year after.

China, obviously, remains the bigger economy but with India accelerating and China still growing at what anyone in the Western world would consider a cracking rate there are obviously still big opportunities for coal.

The latest forecasts from the Australian government’s Department of Industry add a little more weight to the optimistic case even though they are in category of crystal ball gazing of the sort that has a way of being wrong as often as right.

But, with that qualification about forecasts there is no escaping the official view about Australian coal which is that tonnes exported will rise over the next five years, as will the value of those tonnes.

Thermal coal exports are tipped to rise from 195 million tonnes last year to 234Mt in 2020. Metallurgical coal exports are tipped to rise from 180Mt to 204Mt.

Values should rise from $16.7 billion to $18 billion for thermal, which is a modest annual compound increase 1.3%. Met coal should rise from $23.3 billion to $29.2 billion, which is more impressive 3.8% a year.

Anyone can, and will, argue about statistics and forecasts but when that latest collection is added to what New Hope is doing and what the Asian Development Bank is predicting for India and China it gets harder to be a pessimist about the outlook for coal.