Polish miner Jastrzebska Spolka Weglowa (JSW) said Thursday its total coking coal sales in the first quarter fell 7.1% year on year to 2.6 million mt thanks to the disposal of its WZK Victoria mine.
However, coking coal sales to external customers rose 7.1% to 1.513 million mt, the company said in a report of its first-quarter results. Sales to customers within JSW's capital group fell to 1.108 million mt from 1.372 million mt a year earlier.
JSW, Europe's largest hard coking coal miner, said its external sales benefited from a 163% year-on-year rise in the average price of its hard and semi soft coking coal to Zloty 823.05/mt ($221/mt).
"Our first-quarter performance was very satisfactory, but we need to remember that we are operating on a cyclical and rapidly changing market. Currently, we are focusing on organic growth, further efficiency improvements and investments enabling us to achieve planned coal production levels," acting CEO Daniel Ozon said in a statement. The company's unit mining cost increased 14.4% year on year to Zloty 285.18/mt.
The company said it sold 78.7% of its coking coal volumes outside the capital group to domestic customers and 21.3% to international customers, from 75.7% and 24.3% respectively in Q1 2016.
In terms of revenue, Polish customers accounted for 53% of coking coal sales, while the largest international customers came from Austria (13%), followed by the Czech Republic (11%), Italy (8%), Slovakia (6%), India (4%) and Germany (2%).
Coking coal production in the first quarter was flat year on year at 2.826 million mt, which accounted for 71% of JSW's total output from JSW's five mines.
The Borynia-Zofiowka-Jastrzebie and Pniowek mines produced mainly coking coal with low ash, sulfur and volatile matter content.
The Budryk and Knurow-Szczyglowice mines produced mainly coking gas coal with low ash and sulfur content with a higher amount of volatile matter.
In the coke segment, JSW said its sales fell 22.2% year on year to 700,000 mt, despite a 6% rise in global steel production, but it achieved an average coke sales price of Zloty 1036.22/mt, up 81% year on year.
Coke production fell 20% year on year to 838,000 mt and blast furnace coke accounted for 72.7% of total coke output. Industrial coke accounted for 20.6%.
The company swung to a Q1 net profit of Zloty 863 million ($231.4 million) from a net loss of Zloty 59.5 million a year earlier.
As part of its cost-cutting program, JSW said it shut down its Krupinski mine and transferred it to the state mining restructuring company, SRK, on March 31. It closed down the Jas-Mos mining area in October.
