The move would reinforce beliefs that China’s appetite for imported coal is waning. Over the past three decades, China has enjoyed an investment-driven economic boom averaging around 10%, fuelled by commodities. But China’s growth has slowed over the past couple of years and in 2012 GDP growth eased to 7.8%. Indeed, analysts have been gradually revising their growth projections for 2013 below 7.5%.
“The move from an investment-driven economy to one based on domestic consumption implies that China won’t be looking to gobble commodities like it did in the past,” says Ferry Wong, head of equity research at Citi in Indonesia.
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