By Fred Wang and Anita Nugraha

January 7, 2019 - Indonesia's Ministry of Energy and Mineral Resources has set its January thermal coal reference price, also known as Harga Batubara Acuan or HBA, at $92.41/mt, down 0.11% month on month, and down 3.28% year on year.

China's import limitation impacted the seaborne thermal coal prices, according to the ministry's spokesman Agung Pribadi.

The ministry had set the price for December at $92.51/mt, and for January 2018 at $95.54/mt.

The HBA is a monthly average price based 25% each on Platts Kalimantan 5,900 kcal/kg GAR assessments, Argus-Indonesia Coal Index 1 (6,500 kcal/kg GAR), Newcastle Export Index (6,322 kcal/kg GAR) and globalCOAL Newcastle (6,000 kcal/kg NAR).

In December, the daily Platts FOB Kalimantan 5,900 kcal/kg GAR coal assessment averaged $68.02/mt, down from $69.35/mt in November, while the daily 7-45 day Platts Newcastle FOB price for coal with a calorific value of 6,300 kcal/kg GAR averaged $99.93/mt, up from $99.42/mt in November.

The HBA price for thermal coal is the basis for determining the prices of 77 Indonesian coal products, and calculating the royalty producers have to pay for each metric ton of coal sold.

It is based on 6,322 kcal/kg GAR coal with 8% total moisture content, 15% ash as received and 0.8% sulfur as received.