Steps taken by Beijing to depress coal prices are casting a shadow on Beijing ’s drive to become a global price-setting hub for commodities. The country has been trying to boost its influence in pricing commodities from iron ore to oil by promoting Chinese futures contracts as benchmarks. However, a wave of moves to cool coal prices, which rose on the back of government measures to tackle pollution and curb mining, showed China could be reluctant to trade openly. BEIJING (Reuters) - Unprecedented steps by Beijing to snuff out a months-long rally in coal prices are casting fresh doubts on China’s drive to become a global price-setting hub for commodities worth trillions of dollars. "If NDRC can do this to the coal industry, it can deploy the same strategy with other commodities," said Joseph Radford , director at NDRC energy institute.
Steps taken by Beijing to depress coal prices are casting a shadow on Beijing ’s drive to become a global price-setting hub for commodities. The country has been trying to boost its influence in pricing commodities from iron ore to oil by promoting Chinese futures contracts as benchmarks. However, a wave of moves to cool coal prices, which rose on the back of government measures to tackle pollution and curb mining, showed China could be reluctant to trade openly. "If NDRC can do this to the coal industry, it can deploy the same strategy with other commodities," said Joseph Radford , director at NDRC energy institute.