The Chinese vanadium market may turn to a deficit this year, underpinned by revised standards for the tensile strength of rebar products and a ban on vanadium slag imports, sources told Metal Bulletin.The new standard proposes eliminating 335MPa-tensile strength rebar and replacing it with 600MPa-tensile strength rebar that will have greater earthquake resistance, which will mean produce...Read More

Concerns over supplies for the year ahead and a strong purchasing appetite from traders and mills continued to provide momentum to noble alloys prices in the first few days of January. Molybdic oxide prices staged the most impressive gains in the (usually quiet) first days of the year, jumping to $10.70-11 per lb, in-warehouse Rotterdam, on Wednesday January 3. Prices were assessed up 10.2% f...Read More

Although Indonesia is set to see shipments of bauxite to China grow in 2018, years of absence from the market due to its export ban means its traditional role as primary supplier is unlikely to be regained any time soon. As of the end of October 2017, China had imported 562,924 tonnes of bauxite from Indonesia since July when the first shipment from PT Aneka Tambang (PT Antam) reached China in fou...Read More

Heavy Chinese investment in Indonesian nickel smelting and stainless steel production means that an increasing quantity of nickel ore mined in the country will be consumed internally from 2018 onwards.In spite of higher production in the coming year, Indonesian nickel pig iron (NPI) exports to China will fall in 2018 as around 180,000 tonnes of nickel metal will be consumed domestically on an ...Read More

Mason Graphite's Lac Gueret graphite project near Baie Comeau, Quebec. Source: Mason Graphite Inc.Mason Graphite Inc. [LLG-TSXV; MGPHF-OTCQX] said Thursday January 4 that it has raised $45 million from a private placement offering of 18.75 million shares priced at $2.40 per share.Mason is a graphite mining and processing company focused on developing the 100%-owned Lac Gueret Project in northern Q...Read More

The December issue of BullionStar's 'Gold Market Charts' looks at developments in the world's major physical gold markets during November, the latest month for which the relevant data is available. Each month, this series of article uses gold charts from the GOLD CHARTS R US market charting website.SGE Gold WithdrawalsPhysical gold withdrawals from the vaults of the Shanghai Gold Exchange (SGE...Read More

Metal Bulletin proposes to amend its international cobalt price specifications as a result of changes in the market, and invitesfeedback on the following consultation.The deadline for Stage 1 feedback is Friday January 12. Click on the image above to download the full-sized PDF.Read More

The Fort Hills oil sands project is located 90 km north of Fort McMurray, Alberta. Source: Suncor Energy Inc.Teck Resources Ltd. [TECK.B-TSX; TECK-NYSE] and Suncor Energy Inc. [SU-TSX] are taking a bigger stake in the Fort Hills oil sands project in Alberta, Teck said in a progress update. With an expected mine life in excess of 50 years, the Fort Hills oil sands project in the Athabasca region of...Read More

Turkish deep-sea scrap trading remained silent again on Thursday January 4, as most suppliers were still out of the market due to heavy winter conditions and holiday outages.The country's steel mills were expected to try to book more cargoes for February, but the supply was tight and there were not many cargoes available in the market, Metal Bulletin was told."Scrap collection is slow due to heavy...Read More

The Chinese government has finished issuing the first two rounds of solid waste import licenses for 2018, with copper scrap import license numbers and tonnages both more than 94% lower. The first round of licenses was granted in late December 2017, with the second round granted this week - all for imports delivered in 2018. According to official files obtained by Metal Bulletin, copper scrap (HS c...Read More

The drive for greater transparency in financial markets will power into fifth gear from the start of January as the second iteration of Europe's Markets in Financial Instruments Directive (MiFID II) comes into effect. MiFID II - the European Union's first regulatory update to the directive since 2004 - will kick in on Wednesday January 3 and is designed to make European markets safer and more tran...Read More

Investors Free Sign UpMember LoginBecome a MemberNews FeedsSubmit NewsEditor's PicksVideoPodcastsWine Down CornerCompaniesMarketplaceShop 2018: The Year of Living DangerouslySource: Michael Ballanger for Streetwise Reports January 4, 2018 (Investorideas.com Newswire) What does the New Year hold in terms of prospects for investors in gold, silver and copper? How will central banks and cryptocu...Read More

Investors Free Sign UpMember LoginBecome a MemberNews FeedsSubmit NewsEditor's PicksVideoPodcastsWine Down CornerCompaniesMarketplaceShop Expert Calls this Explorer a BuySource: Adrian Day for Streetwise Reports January 4, 2018 (Investorideas.com Newswire) Adrian Day of Adrian Day Asset Management describes why investors should consider this "well-run gold exploration company with downside pr...Read More

Base metals traded on the London Metal Exchange are for the most part little changed this morning, Thursday January 4, apart from nickel and copper prices that are up by 0.8% and 0.6%, with the latter at $7,220 per tonne. Volume has picked up with 9,663 lots traded as of 07:01 am London time. This follows a diverse performance on Wednesday that saw copper, aluminium, nickel and zinc close dow...Read More

Investors Free Sign UpMember LoginBecome a MemberNews FeedsSubmit NewsEditor's PicksVideoPodcastsWine Down CornerCompaniesMarketplaceShop Peat Resources Limited (TSXV: PET) Announces Increase in Size of Private Placement Toronto, Ontario - January 4, 2018 (Newsfile Corp.) (Investorideas.com Newswire) Peat Resources Limited (TSXV: PET) (the "Company"), announces that the Company is increasing...Read More

The United States was founded on secession. It didn’t have to be violent, but it was. Whose fault was that? Was it the United States’ fault for insisting on more local governance? Or was it England’s fault for ignoring the consent of the governed?In 1991, when Ukraine and Belarus declared their independence from the USSR, things did not end violently. They were allowed to exit th...Read More

Turkey has reduced the import duty applied to incoming shipments of hot-rolled coil (HRC) intended for re-rollers to 3.5% from the previous 5%, with effect from Monday January 1.The duty remains at 9% for other HRC imports, Metal Bulletin has heard.Market...Read More

Metal Bulletin has amended its Brazilian domestic steel prices to reflect standard market practices, making changes to the calculation of its monthly assessments. Local taxes are now excluded from the price calculation methodologies.Previously, all Brazilian domestic flat steel prices - Brazil domestic cold rolled coil ex-works Reais per tonne monthly, Brazil domestic hot-dipped galvanized coil ex...Read More

Trade protection measures in the Middle East could support local steel producers' attempts to capture much of the increased regional steel demand expected in 2018. Gulf Co-operation Council (GCC) nations are due to make a final decision by the second quarter of this year on whether to impose anti-dumping duties on Chinese non-welded oil country tubular goods (OCTG) made of iron or steel with a rad...Read More

CloseGain/LossGold $1321.90+$7.00Silver$17.20+$0.06XAU87.79+0.81%HUI198.76+0.72%GDM663.40+0.37%JSE Gold1305.19-33.54USD91.87-0.31Euro120.68+0.56Yen88.70-0.27Oil$62.01+$0.3810-Year2.452%+0.012T-Bond152.34375+0.03125Dow25075.13+0.61%Nasdaq7077.92+0.18%S&P2723.99+0.40% The Metals: Gold fell $9 to $1305.90 in Asia, but it then climbed to as high as $1325.80 in New York and ended with a gain of...Read More