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Coal producers are suffering through a historic rout. Over the past five years, the industry has lost 94 <br />percent of its market value, from $68.6 billion to $4.02 billion. <br />Plunging Coal <br />The combined market cap of publicly traded US coal miners has cratered since 2011 <br />$70 billion <br />60 <br />50 <br />40 <br />30 <br />20 <br />0 <br />2007 2008 2009 2010 2011 2012 2013 2014 2015 2016 <br />111„ . t I I'll 'I-, Bloomberg • <br />In addition, Fitch Ratings said in a Jan. 11 report that Arch's bankruptcy pushed the sector's default rate to <br />"an unprecedented peak" of 43 percent. So investors are now raising questions about the viability of other <br />miners, such as Consol Energy Inc., Foresight Energy LP, Cloud Peak Energy Inc. and Murray Energy <br />Corp. <br />"This once mighty industry is destined to gradually shrink in importance, and virtually disappear as an <br />investable sector," said Margie Patel, a portfolio manager with Wells Fargo Asset Management in Boston, <br />which manages $351 billion. <br />Big Debt <br />Peabody and Arch were among the miners that raised a total of $6.4 billion of debt in 2010 and 2011, <br />betting that prices for metallurgical coal, which is sometimes used to produce steel, would continue to rise <br />thanks to China's growing demand to build its cities. After reaching $330 per metric ton in 2011, prices <br />have since tanked to a quarter of that level. Goldman Sachs Group Inc. forecasts benchmark metallurgical <br />coal prices to fall to $75 this year. <br />Peabody has been working on a debt exchange with its lenders since last year, but has yet to agree to a deal - <br />- Arch tried a similar tact before it went under and failed, accelerating its demise. <br />"Could Peabody do a debt exchange? Possibly, but does that really solve the big picture problem?" Mark <br />Levin, an analyst at BB&T Capital Markets in Richmond, Virginia, wrote in a note to clients Wednesday. <br />"The board has to ask itself if it's better off restructuring." <br />Capital Cushion <br />In terms of capital, Peabody had $1.4 billion in liquidity including cash and availability under its revolving <br />loans as of Nov. 5, according to a company filing. Its cash dropped to $167.4 million on that day from <br />