Platinum, palladium price unmoved by strike talks failure |
- Platinum, palladium price unmoved by strike talks failure
- US Energy Department said to have illegally transferred uranium to private firm
- TrueGold surges after extending Burkina Faso find
- 'Iron lady' will define future of world’s top copper producer
- Pilot Gold shares advance again after hitting new zone
- This deserted African mining town is almost flooded by sand… and ghosts
| Platinum, palladium price unmoved by strike talks failure Posted: 09 Jun 2014 02:46 PM PDT The latest round of strike negotiations at South Africa's PGM mines ended in failure on Monday prompting the responsible minister to abandon his mediation role. More than 70,000 workers at the world's three largest platinum and palladium producers, Anglo American Platinum (LON:AAL), Impala Platinumm (OTCMKTS:IMPUY) and Lonmin (LON:LMI), have been on strike since January 23. Leader of the Amcu union Joseph Mathunjwa said the latest talks broke down after the union refused to compromise on its demand for the immediate implementation of R12,500 ($1,175) a month basic wage. Newly-installed Minister of Mineral Resources Ngoako Ramatlhodi subsequently made good on a vow to withdraw from the process if no resolution were found by the end of last week. The nearly five-month long strike has seen mining output in the African nation plummet leading to a contraction in the overall economy during the first quarter. The companies' which together contribute 40% of global supply have lost combined revenue of some R21 billion ($1.9 billion) while striking workers have forfeited roughly $900 million in wages. July platinum was little changed on Monday to trade at $1,452 an ounce and is worth less today than when the strike was announced. Year to date platinum is up more than 4%. June palladium gave up a couple of dollars on the day at $842 an ounce, not far off a three-year high. Palladium hit a record price of $865 in February 2011 and is up 17% this year. Roughly 10,000 ounces of platinum production and 5,000 ounces of palladium are lost each day the strike drags on. Even when strikers do return to work it would take up to three months to restart production. South Africa and Russia combined account for close to 80% of global supply of palladium and 70% of platinum output which are mainly used to clean emissions in automobiles.  |
| US Energy Department said to have illegally transferred uranium to private firm Posted: 09 Jun 2014 12:13 PM PDT  US Department of Energy. Washington, DC. US Department of Energy officials did not have legal authority to transfer millions of dollars worth of uranium resources to the only local company that uses American-developed technology to enrich the commodity, a report by the Government Accountability Office (GAO) revealed Monday. The company, United States Enrichment Corp. (USEC), stopped enrichment activities in May last year, declaring bankruptcy in March, as a result of weak demand from nuclear plants, its outdated enrichment facility in Kentucky and a shortage of capital to invest in new technology and a plant in Ohio. The GAO examined four transfers of uranium by the Energy Department in 2012 and 2013 that indirectly provided USEC (NYSE:USU) with operating cash. The above is possible because the Energy Department sometimes puts a value on uranium transfers — known as tailings — taken from its vast stockpile while other times treats them as worthless or even an environmental liability, according to the report. "For the largest transaction — DOE's transfer of tails to a third party for re-enrichment — GAO believes that DOE likely did not have authority to transfer tails under restrictions imposed by the USEC Privatization Act," GAO says. Energy Department officials disputed GAO, claiming sufficient authority under the Atomic Energy Act to conduct the transfer. But the congressional watchdog countered, noting that "even if DOE had such authority … it did not meet the act's requirement to charge a price for the [uranium] because it transferred them without charging any price at all." In another of the four transactions, the accountability office report notes the Energy Department transferred ownership of uranium "that it previously obtained to meet national security needs, without obtaining a presidential determination that the uranium material was no longer necessary for national security needs." The GAO also questions whether the Energy Department knows if the actual value of the uranium assets involved in the four transfers. The Obama administration has paid special attention to USEC because of the firm's unusual history — as well as the location of its plants in key political swing states, as The Washington Post reported in January 2012. The US government began supplying enriched uranium to military and commercial users in the 1940s. By 1992, it had established the USEC, which was privatized six years later. Image courtesy of the US Department of Energy. |
| TrueGold surges after extending Burkina Faso find Posted: 09 Jun 2014 11:56 AM PDT
 TrueGold Mining (CVE:TGM) jumped more 6% on Monday on heavy volumes, after announcing strong results from step-out drilling at its Karma Gold Project's Nami deposit in Burkina Faso. During lunchtime trade the Vancouver-based junior was trading at $0.41, up 6.% on the Toronto Venture Exchange, off its highs for the day. More than 445,000 shares in the $163 million company changed hands and the counter is up 14% over the past month. TrueGold intersected 29.5 g/t gold over 6.0 metres and extended the Nami deposit 250 metres north, along a corridor 150 metres wide. This extension has the potential to add an additional 50% to the strike length of the current Nami deposit outlined in the project feasibility study the company said in a statement. "We strongly believe that this northern Nami extension will add to the overall resource at Nami in much the same way that North Kao has added to the Kao deposit," said Scott Heffernan, VP for Exploration adding that "Ongoing exploration results like these continue to support our belief that the resource expansion potential at Karma is exceptional." North Kao was a blind discovery in 2013 and now has an inferred mineral resource of 1.66 million ounces (47.8 million tonnes at an average grade of 1.08 g/t gold), TrueGold pointed out. The Karma feasibility released in December calls for a $130 million mine at Karma which is 90%-owned by TrueGold with the Burkina Faso government holding the remainder. Karma's probable reserves are pegged at 949,000 ounces (33.2mt at 0.89 g/t) and the operation could produce 97,000 ounces on average annually for 8.5 years starting end-2015. What makes Karma stand out are all-in sustaining costs of $720 and direct cash costs of $591 thanks to shallow pits and proposed heap-leach extraction and what the company characterizes as "strong gold grades, excellent infrastructure, low power and water requirements, strong recoveries from simple metallurgy and soft, free digging material." TrueGold also owns 100% of the Liguidi gold project in Burkina Faso. Burkina Faso with a population of 16 million people, is the continent's fourth largest gold producer after Mali and has commissioned eight new mines over the past six years. |
| 'Iron lady' will define future of world’s top copper producer Posted: 09 Jun 2014 11:19 AM PDT  Laura Albornoz has twisted Codelco's arm before. She introduced a program to incorporate more women into the copper industry. The future of Chile's owned Codelco, the world's No.1 copper producer, is said to be now in the hands of Laura Albornoz, the first woman appointed director, who played an important role in last week dismissal of CEO Thomas Keller. "Codelco has had management issues that isn't just down to the international price of copper," Albornoz was quoted as saying by Bloomberg Monday. "We can take the company a lot further than where we have got it to now." The executive, a lawyer and former minister of the National Service for Women (Sernam), voiced her concerns on the management style at Codelco as soon as she was appointed in May. "I have serious reservations regarding the management of Codelco, the entire administration should and will be scrutinized," she said in an interview with El Diario Financiero (in Spanish) last month. She has said that Codelco can't be treated like a privately held company because of the role it has in generating wealth in Chile, and how much workers feel part of the company. "There is a very emotional bond. The perspective of a woman could bring something to the debate," she said according to Bloomberg. Budget decisions As one of the newest members of Codelco's board, Albornoz is gearing up to vote in the upcoming yearly budget, which is considered by the finance ministry every June. The copper giant invested more than $8 billion since 2012 and is expected to spend $5 billion this year. Without that investment, Keller said in January, output would drop by more than half.  Albornoz is scheduled to visit the old Chuquicamata mine next week, where relations between Keller and the workers have been at their worst. As a state-owned company, Codelco has often been in a tug-of-war with the government over its investment budget. Of about $100bn in profits that Codelco has transferred to the state since it was nationalized in 1971, only $4bn has been returned back to the miner. The mining company is undergoing a massive transformation, trying to maintain profits from the world's largest open-pit copper mine, Chuquicamata, by extending operations underground. At the same time, plans call for turning the world's largest underground mine, El Teniente, into an open pit operation. But Albornoz, who implemented a program to incorporate more women into the copper industry between 2006 and 2009, seems to be more focused on resolving labour issues first. She is scheduled to visit the old Chuquicamata mine next week, where relations between Keller and the workers have been at their worst. And while she hasn't given away any clues regarding who Keller's successor will be, she told El Diario Financiero (in Spanish) it was only reasonable to think the head of Codelco will not only have to be someone who does the job best, but also an individual "able to reflect the government program and values." Images from Wikimedia Commons and archives. |
| Pilot Gold shares advance again after hitting new zone Posted: 09 Jun 2014 10:41 AM PDT  Kinsley Mountain hosts near-surface mineralization similar to other Carlin-style, sediment-hosted gold systems along a 2.2 kilometre, SE-NW strike extent. Shares in Pilot Gold (TSE:PLG) jumped nearly 3% on Monday after another set of strong results from drilling at its Kinsley Mountain project in Nevada defined a new gold zone. In lunchtime trade the Vancouver-based junior was changing hands at $1.43, up 2.9% on the Toronto Exchange, at its highs for the day. The $146 million company's stock is down from March highs, but year to date the company is still up a whopping 65%. The company reported last week drilling at Kinsley Mountain's Right Spot target – around 1km from the Western Flank zone discovered last year – has returned long runs of predominantly oxide gold mineralization. The Right Spot target is located along the 2 kilometre-long NNE Western Flank trend, 1 kilometre south of the recently discovered high-grade zone. Highlights from Right Spot include:
Matt Lennox-King, President and CEO said ""We are at a tipping point in the evolution of Kinsley Mountain, with compelling near surface oxidized mineralization complementing the high grade Western Flank zone," stated Matt Lennox-King, President and CEO. The company expanded its 2014 summer exploration program by $1.57 million and 8,600 additional metres of drilling. Drilling at Kinsley is ongoing with two RC and one diamond core rig. Targets currently being tested include extensions to high-grade mineralization in the Western Flank target area and an initial test of near-surface and deeper targets in the Secret Spot target area, located 1 km to the southwest of the Right Spot. Since inception of the summer drilling program, a total of 5,018 metres in four core and 13 RC holes has been drilled, with assays pending for 10 holes, the company said in a statement. Pilot Gold said the Western Flank target, located 550 metres northwest of the past-producing pits at Kinsley, remains open in all directions. Western Flank drilling has returned such intercepts as 8.53 grams gold over 36.6 metres and 10.5 grams gold over 42.7 metres. In late May 2014 Pilot Gold leased five patented claims (66 acres) located to the south of the historic Kinsley mine where prior operators intersected gold mineralization at and near surface within the Candland Shale. Pilot also conducted surface mapping and sampling to refine targets in the southern portion of the property. Pilot Gold was created as part of Newmont Mining's acquisition of Fronteer Gold in 2011. The company owns 78% of Kinsley and is also advancing projects in Labrador and Turkey. |
| This deserted African mining town is almost flooded by sand… and ghosts Posted: 09 Jun 2014 09:32 AM PDT Namibia's ghost town of Kolmanskop, abandoned when diamond-mining operations ceased half a century ago, is slowly disappearing under mountains of sand that have failed to cover what some claim to be its main attraction: haunted spirits. In the early 1900s, after the discovery of diamonds in the southern Namib desert, German miners flocked to the area, developing this unique town known as Kolmanskop. Here you can see a few striking photos, which show just how dramatically the desert is moving into the town. Hat Tip: Instagram Blog _____________ Images credits: Michiel Van Balen, via Flickr, Damien du Toit, via Flickr, coda, via Flickr, thefella, via Instagram, and saruzzza, via Instagram. |
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