It turns out the Wall Street Journal is also thinking this way with its story on a hedge fund that thinks a coal turnaround is here.

The paper looks at Dmitry Balyasny’s Balyasny Asset Management, which doubled its position in Walter Energy during the third quarter of 2012 to 2 million shares.

It made the stock one of its five largest holdings by market value.

According to the Journal’s Market Watch column, it has increased its holding to 3.4 million shares.

The columnist’s view is that Balyasny, who is known to be macro-oriented investor, is banking on steel producers such as US Steel Corp to start ramping up demand for metallurgical coal.

Perhaps there is hope for a turnaround.