Iran is stepping up talks with potential foreign investors with an eye to developing its mining and metals industries according to Mehdi Karbasian, president of Imidro a state-owned group pushing for mine development in the country, Platts News reported on Wednesday.The annual value of Iran's mining and metals imports and exports only amount to $11.5 billion at the moment, but following the lift...Read More
The copper price fell again on Wednesday and is now down more than 10% over the past month as the economic news out of number one consumer China continues to rattle investors.In morning New York trade July copper, the most active contract, fell more than 2% exchanging hands for $2.0515 a pound ($4,522 a tonne) following a reading of Chinese manufacturing activity that Beijing's economic stim...Read More
Brazil's mining sector is expected to recover its long-lost appeal to investors and see a fresh wave of mergers and acquisitions, as mineral prices begin to settle and major producers look to sell core assets to reduce debt loads, a new report shows.According to BMI Research, mining deals are already picking in South America's largest nation. As of May 23, investment and M&As in the resources sect...Read More
Against expectations and in some instances in defiance of fundamentals, commodities managed to climb a wall of worry over the first four months of 2016 giving mining companies a welcome boost after three years of declines.Sell in May and go away is one of the oldest adages on the equities market and it was especially true for the mining sector in 2016. While broader US share markets moved sidewa...Read More
Last year lead was the best-performing base metal on the LME by virtue of dropping by the least over the duration of 2015.The lead price declined 2.8% last year compared to 20%-plus falls in zinc, tin, cobalt and copper and ever volatile nickel's 42% drop (moly fared just as badly).In 2015 lead was buoyed by expectations of a handful of significant mine closures, a reduction in Chinese stockpiles...Read More
A new report by BMI Research forecasts the global mining project pipeline will continue to narrow in 2016 and 2017 as low metals and mineral prices force miners into further cost cuts and lower capital spending.However, a handful of countries are set to continue to make significant investment into both brownfield and greenfield projects, bolstered by a combination of low production costs, high-gr...Read More
Unionized workers at Sibanye Gold's (JSE:SGL) (NYSE:SBGL) Kroondal platinum mine in South Africa began Friday an indefinite strike over transport, bonuses and safety pay.The Association of Mineworkers and Construction Union (AMCU), the country's platinum industry largest union, wants the company to provide miners with transportation and increased safety, as many members have been attacked after wo...Read More
Australia's Mineral Resources (ASX:MIN) is a mining services company supplying a wide range of services including remote site power and aerodrome services, plant processing and crushing, pipeline design, port logistics and sales.The Perth-based company has operated BC Iron's 7mtpa Iron Valley mine in the central region of the Pilbara since August 2014. Ore is transported to Port Hedland and Minera...Read More
Vancouver, BC - Kincora Copper Limited (the "Company", "Kincora") (TSXV:KCC) is pleased to announce it has reached agreement providing for the merger of two Kincora subsidiaries with Ibex Land Mongolia LLC and Ibex Mongolia LLC ("Ibex"), entities indirectly controlled by High Power Exploration Inc ("HPX").The transaction will result in a consolidated landholding of over 1,500km2, the majority of t...Read More
The Olympic Dam is the fifth largest copper mine in the world, and the No.1 uranium deposit. (Image courtesy of BHP Billiton)World's largest miner BHP Billiton (ASX, NYSE:BHP) (LON:BLT) has made a bold bet on copper and it's starting by finding a way to boost output for the red metal from its Olympic Dam, Australia's biggest underground mine, even before a proposed and long-awaited mega-expansion...Read More
Canadian seafloor miner Nautilus Minerals (TSX, LON:NUS) posted Thursday upgraded mineral resource estimates for its underwater mining project in the Eastern Pacific, off the coast of Mexico, which shows the venture is much richer than originally thought.The project's inferred mineral resource base went up from 410 million tonnes to 685 million tonnes (wet).According to the updated estimate, th...Read More
A study of private capital in the resources sector by industry tracker Preqin finds significant growth since the global financial crisis in the debt fundraising market with 54 funds closed since 2010 raising more than $29bn.According to Preqin which tracks 1,520 funds active in natural resources investment around the world, at the moment there are 32 unlisted natural resources funds in the ma...Read More
10,000 meters of core drilling could extend Deep Kerr block cave resource 800 meters to the southTORONTO, (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) - Seabridge Gold (TSX:SEA) (NYSE:SA) today outlined its 2016 exploration plans at its 100%-owned KSM Project in northwestern British Columbia. The program calls for 10,000 meters of core drilling designed to expand by as much as 800 meters the block cave shapes that confine t...Read More
Cambridge UK & Santiago Chile - 25th May 2016 - Cambridge, UK-based IntelliSense.io and AngloAmerican announce that they have initiated a joint project for IntelliSense.io to optimise the energy and water utilisation of the pipeline, which supplies recovered tailings water to the Confluencia Plant at its Los Bronces copper operation in Santiago, Chile. IntelliSense.io and AngloAmerican were awarde...Read More
When we think of the mining industry, you immediately think big. Big mounds of earth being moved. Big machines. Big money. Big companies. Big owners. Big, big, big, big. Even what's considered a small mine' is still massive when you consider the scheme of elements being moved, production figures and the machinery operated relative to the everyday rise and grind of regular business. But in an indus...Read More
Canada's mining sector got a shot in the arm in the first three months of 2016, recording gains that outperformed both the Toronto Stock Exchange and the London Metals Exchange in the period, a new report shows.The welcome bonanza, says Ernst & Young, was fuelled mainly by recovering gold prices, which rallied 16% in the first quarter of the year, after falling about 10% in 2015.The Canadian Mini...Read More
Peruvian President Ollanta Humala has declared a 60-day state of emergency in a large remote area of the Amazon jungle as levels of mercury from illegal gold mining have reached record high levels.According to country's environment minister, as many as 50,000 people or 41% of the population of the gold-rich Madre de Dios region, bordering Brazil, has been exposed to mercury contamination.Even chi...Read More
Rio Tinto has appointed Stephen McIntosh as the acting Group executive, Technology & Innovation to succeed Greg Lilleyman, who will leave the company after 25 years of service.Stephen has been with Rio Tinto for almost 30 years working on projects in more than 45 countries spanning the A-Z of minerals and metals. Most recently, he was head of Exploration, leading a 450-strong global team of employ...Read More
Workers at BHP Billiton's (ASX, NYSE: BHP) Spence copper mine in northern Chile, the world's largest producer of the metal, have begun a 24-hour strike, a union representative said Monday, citing slow progress in labour talks.Strike comes on the heels of BHP's recent announcement that it's studying a $2.2 billion investment to expand the operation.The action follows two other one-day protests at t...Read More
The price of copper in New York closed at its lowest level in more than three months on Friday after one of the largest producers of the metal predicted weaker prices for at least the next two years.On the Comex market in New York July futures settled at $2.0555 a pound (around $4,500 a tonne), the lowest since February 12.After a brutal couple of weeks of trading copper is down 10% in May, wi...Read More