Richard Bay Coal price drops to $90.3, near 3-year low

March 05, 2025 (MLN): The price of Richards Bay coal has dropped to $90.30, declining by $17.55 or 16.27%, marking a near low since March 2021, when it was at $87.20.

The contract's trading range over the past 5 years spans from a low of $106.90 to a high of $110.35.

The contract's trading range over the past 6 months has been between a low of $91.25 and a high of $90.

Richard Bay Coal Monthly is a futures contract that is based on the price of coal loaded at the Richards Bay Coal Terminal in South Africa.

It is traded on the ICE/EU exchange and has a contract size of 1,000 metric tonnes.

South African coal  the second-largest export earner by commodity has had a rough start to the year, with Richards Bay Coal Terminal prices dipping below $100 per tonne, exactly where they were a year ago.

This year is likely to see more downward pressure on prices as global demand peaked in 2023 and is expected to remain at current levels of about 8.77 billion tonnes through 2027, according to the International Energy Agency.

In 2024, Asia's share of South Africa's coal exports increased to 43.99 million tons, or 84.5% of the total, up from 37.1m the previous year. India accounted for 25.75m tons of the exports, while Pakistan imported 2.37m tons, as Reuters reported.

Shipments to Europe, which surged to 14.3m tons in 2022 after the European Union banned coal from Russia following the invasion of Ukraine, further declined to 3.54m tons last year, after falling to 6.8m tons in 2023.

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