China's coking coal import quotas have changed the dynamics of the seaborne market, making the trading of the steelmaking raw material more risky, time-consuming and expensive for traders.
What was typically a month-long process for a vessel carrying Australian coking coal to deliver to China has stretched to at least four months after import quotas became scarcer and port restrictions became tighter.At the time of writing, vessels of Australian coking coal that had arrived in early June are still waiting at the anchorages of the ports of Jingtang and Caofeidian - a wait for three months so far -...