Anglo American cuts full-year guidance for thermal coal

Extract from Quarterly Report by Anglo American, October 22

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Metallurgical Coal – Export metallurgical coal production decreased by 26% to 4.8 million tonnes, principally due to the suspension of operations at Grosvenor following the underground gas ignition incident in May 2020. Open cut operations have been scaled back at Dawson and Capcoal in response to Covid-19 reduced demand for lower quality metallurgical coal.

The ratio of hard coking coal production to PCI/semi-soft coking coal was 82:18, lower than in Q3 2019 (85:15), due to a lower proportion of product coming from the underground operations.
The year to date average realised price for hard coking coal was $114/tonne, which was lower than the
benchmark price of $129/tonne due to a lower volume of premium quality hard coking coal produced from Moranbah and Grosvenor.

Thermal Coal, South Africa – Export thermal coal production increased by 7% to 4.6 million tonnes, principally driven by the ramp up of the Navigation lifex section at Khwezela.

Since August, all mines have been operating at circa 90% production due to the impact of Covid-19 measures to safeguard the workforce.

Covid-19 measures in the logistics chain have affected the loading of volumes onto trains resulting in higher stockpiles at operations.

Thermal Coal, Colombia – Attributable export thermal coal production decreased by 50% to 1.0 million tonnes as a result of an ongoing strike at Cerrejón, which started in September.

This more than offset the ramp up in production earlier in Q3 following the lifting of lockdown restrictions.

The year to date weighted average realised price for export thermal coal from South Africa and Colombia was $53/tonne (South Africa was $56/tonne and Colombia was $45/tonne). This was 10% lower than the weighted average quoted FOB price from South Africa and Colombia due to timing differences and quality discounts relative to the industry benchmark.

Full Year Guidance
Production guidance for metallurgical coal is maintained at 16-18 million tonnes.
Production guidance for export thermal coal is revised to c.19 million tonnes (previously c.21 million tonnes), owing to the ongoing strike disruption in Colombia, subject to the extent of further Covid-19 related disruption.

Source: Anglo American