It was those global leaders tied to coal and copper that moved up the rankings in the past week as the diversified miners headed the other way.

Top of the pack was Coal India (IN:COAL) posting a 6.1% gain.

The Indian company announced last week that it will conduct auctions with those independent power producers in search of long-term coal supply contracts and holding power purchase agreements with state distribution companies. This could amount to 12,000 megawatts of power supply being tied up, according to India’s Economic Times.

Still in Asia, China Shenhua (HK:1088) rose 6% as both thermal and coking coal prices continued rising.

The former, imported into Europe, rose 3.3% to US$83.20 per tonne last week, while premium-grade metallurgical coal prices exported from Australia jumped 7.9% to $175/t.

Met coal prices have been supported by strong demand from the Chinese steel industry of late, a sector expected to increase production on the back of favourable margins in the current quarter.

The only other two companies posting positive gains were Freeport McMoRan (US:FCX) and Southern Copper (US:SCCO), both of which outpaced the 0.3% LME copper price rise to $5,925/t.

Freeport, which rose 3.3%, confirmed last week that employees at its Cerro Verde copper mine in Peru had not gone on strike, despite the nationwide walkout across the country, and that production had continued as planned.

This is despite workers at 56 mining unions in the Andean country striking on July 19 in protest at the government’s proposed labour reforms, according to Ricardo Juarez, head of the National Federation of Mining, Metallurgical and Steel Workers of Peru.

It was a similar set of circumstances that led to Southern Copper’s 2% rise.

The company told the market its two mines in southern Peru were not damaged by a 6.4-magnitude earthquake that struck off the country’s coast a week ago. It, like Freeport, also sought to reassure investors that its mines had not been affected by the country’s strikes.

The biggest fall from the global leaders by market capitalisation came from Vale (BZ:VALE5), which dropped 3.8%, after acknowledging its full-year iron ore output would come in at the lower end of its 360-380 million tonne guidance.

Created from mining-journal.com