Coal shipments from Australia's Gladstone port increased 8.0% from a year earlier to 5.73 million tonnes in November, which also rose 0.2% from a month ago, marking the third consecutive month for growth, showed data from the Gladstone Ports Corporation.

Gladstone shipped 1.33 million tonnes of coal to Japan in the month, dropping 41.9% year on year and 6.7% month on month, while China received 1.20 million tonnes of coal from the port, compared with zero in the corresponding period last year and soaring 237.6% on the month.

Coal exports to India were 1.14 million tonnes in November, rising 43.1% on the year yet down 25.7% on the month, data showed.

Around 70% of Gladstone coal exports are metallurgical coal, used for steelmaking, and the rest 30% are thermal coal for power generation.

The total exports were 57.43 million tonnes during January-November, up 1.1% from a year ago, the data showed.