Its appetite for coal looks insatiable: despite extremely strong domestic output of 400mt/month, imports keep increasing and should top 36mt in May.

However, stockpiles at the ports have also increased to new highs, with DBX real-time satellite based technology measuring port stockpiles above 71mt.

This indicates that strong Chinese imports do not necessarily reflect strong underlying demand from the power and steel industries and that traders who cannot place cargoes use the ports in China as a sink.

Source: DBX Commodities

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