As the headlines earlier this week told you, the US coal industry scored a win at the Supreme Court. With a 5-4 majority it ruled that the Environmental Protection Agency had to consider compliance costs when it issues emissions rules for power plants. The court sent the Mercury and Air Toxics Standards (Mats) back to the agency to justify its net economic benefits.

Whatever short-term cheer this brought to the coal-mining companies, it has come too late to save most of the industry from looming financial disaster. Coal company shares and bonds bounced up for a day and then fell back into depression.

Most US coal capacity, more than 500m tons of annual production, is owned by companies in financial distress. The unsecured bonds of Arch Coal, behind which are more than 130m tons of capacity, are selling for 14 to 17 cents on the dollar. Peabody Coal (about 200m tons of capacity) has a bond maturing in 2018 that is priced at 48 cents on the dollar.