Chinese night futures open: coking coal up nearly 3%, soda ash up nearly 2%

The split within the coal chain is the detail worth noting: coking coal and coke both firmed while caustic soda, a fellow energy-intensive product, slipped, so this reads more like product-specific positioning than a broad industrial bid. The softness in palm oil and soybean No. 2 points to a separate, agricultural-side story running alongside the energy and chemical gains. Whether the coal-linked strength holds through the full session, or fades as it did in a mixed open, is the open question.