The appreciation of the Chinese currency against the US dollar and the suspension of export offers ahead by several mills ahead of the Lunar New Year resulted in East Asian stainless steel prices rising slightly over the past week.Metal Bulletin's assessment of prices for benchmark 304 stainless 2mm cold-rolled coil was $2,250-2,320 per tonne cif East Asian ports for the week ended Wednesday Febru...Read More
China's iron ore imports jumped 9.3% year on year in January to pass 100 million tonnes - making it the second-highest ever monthly total.The world's largest buyer of the steelmaking raw material took in 100.34 million tonnes last month, up from 91.82 million tonnes a year earlier, according to preliminary Chinese customs data...Read More
Metal Bulletin correspondents round up the main topics and trends from the final day of the 2018 Investing in African Mining Indaba. Resource nationalism Miners are expecting a showdown in the Democratic Republic of Congo, where a new mining code is slated to be signed into law. But instead of fighting individual battles, companies are for the first time pulling together in a force that unites bot...Read More
Metal Bulletin correspondents round up the main topics and trends from the final day of the 2018 Investing in African Mining Indaba. Resource nationalism Miners are expecting a showdown in the Democratic Republic of Congo, where a new mining code is slated to be signed into law. But instead of fighting individual battles, companies are for the first time pulling together in a force that unites bot...Read More
Metal Bulletin correspondents round up the main topics and trends from the final day of the 2018 Investing in African Mining Indaba. Resource nationalism Miners are expecting a showdown in the Democratic Republic of Congo, where a new mining code is slated to be signed into law. But instead of fighting individual battles, companies are for the first time pulling together in a force that unites bot...Read More
Metal Bulletin correspondents round up the main topics and trends from the final day of the 2018 Investing in African Mining Indaba. Resource nationalism Miners are expecting a showdown in the Democratic Republic of Congo, where a new mining code is slated to be signed into law. But instead of fighting individual battles, companies are for the first time pulling together in a force that unites bot...Read More
Metal Bulletin correspondents round up the main topics and trends from the final day of the 2018 Investing in African Mining Indaba. Resource nationalism Miners are expecting a showdown in the Democratic Republic of Congo, where a new mining code is slated to be signed into law. But instead of fighting individual battles, companies are for the first time pulling together in a force that unites bot...Read More
(Kitco News) - The beginning stages of a new relationship between bitcoin and gold have been discovered by RBC Capital Markets.The correlation is described as a “marginal[ly] negative” one by Christopher Louney, commodity strategist at RBC Capital Markets.“When we saw interest in bitcoin peak [in December], as measured by Google Trends, that is when we noticed this marginal negat...Read More
Say what you will about the underlying causes moving gold lower or higher, but the bottom line and the real truth is that dollar weakness or dollar strength is an unremovable component of gold pricing, not an outside market.While it is an entirely fair statement to say that there are external markets that are influencing gold prices, one of the most significant factors both during the last rally a...Read More
(Kitco News) - Gold and silver prices ended the U.S. day session solidly lower Wednesday, with gold hitting a four-week bottom and silver a six-week low. Fully bearish “outside markets” were behind the selling pressure in the precious metals today, as the U.S. dollar index rallied sharply and crude oil prices were solidly lower and hit a five-week low. April Comex gold futures were las...Read More
(Kitco News) - Equity markets continue to recover from Monday’s flash crash and while volatility is back, it would take a much bigger correction to boost gold and precious-metals prices on a safe-haven trade, according to one commodity analyst.In a telephone interview with Kitco News, Martin Murenbeeld, president of Murenbeeld & Co., said that while the drop in equity markets was shockin...Read More
(Kitco News) - Gold would face some cross-currents from rising inflation expectations, benefitting as an inflation hedge but also facing potential selling as Treasury yields rise, says Mitsubishi in a weekly report on precious metals. Meanwhile, strategist Jonathan Butler points out that palladium’s premium over platinum is slowly disappearing. Global equities sold off sharply at the start o...Read More
Editor's Note: Welcome to Kitco's new Bitcoin Daily Technical Alert. Every trading day veteran Kitco technical analyst Jim Wyckoff will provide you with a concise and easy-to-understand near-term technical brief on Bitcoin. Importantly, Jim will glean the short-term charts and technical studies, and then alert you to the signals he sees regarding upcoming potential bigger price moves or price tren...Read More
(Kitco News) - Gold continues to experience pressure as investors generate liquidity in the wake of the global equity shakeout. The bounce in equity valuations yesterday was actually a negative for gold prices, as investors assumed the recent drop was merely a retracement, as with past sell-offs, and jumped back into the equity space. Gold, a proxy for liquidity, came under selling pressure as inv...Read More
(Kitco News) - Barrick Gold Corp. (NYSE, TSX: ABX) says it will take a pre-tax $429 million impairment charge for the fourth quarter due to a reclassification of reserves at its Pascua-Lama project located on the border between Argentina and Chile.Last month, Chile’s Superintendencia del Medio Ambiente ordered the closure of existing infrastructure on the Chilean side of the project as part...Read More
The latest news and price moves to start the Asian day on Wednesday February 7.Base metals prices on the London Metal Exchange closed the day lower across the board on Tuesday February 6, with nickel's 2.4% decline leading the charge. Read more in our live futures report. Here are how LME prices looked at Tuesday's close:Meanwhile, Comex copper prices were pulled lower on Tuesday by a combination...Read More
The latest news and price moves to start the Asian day on Wednesday February 7.Base metals prices on the London Metal Exchange closed the day lower across the board on Tuesday February 6, with nickel's 2.4% decline leading the charge. Read more in our live futures report. Here are how LME prices looked at Tuesday's close:Meanwhile, Comex copper prices were pulled lower on Tuesday by a combination...Read More
The heads of mining companies should not be complacent about higher prices and need to continue to run their operations as efficiently as possible, the chief executive officer of Konkola Copper Mines (KCM) told Metal Bulletin. Steve Din said during an interview on the sidelines of the Mining Indaba conference in Cape Town, South Africa that the mining sector must avoid a tendency to become exubera...Read More
Copper premiums in the United States and China were broadly unchanged over the past week, while those in northern Europe softened amid lower offer prices from sellers. Lower offer prices sink northern European premiumsUS copper premium steady, potential near-term rise eyedShanghai premiums broadly flat ahead of Lunar New Year holidays Copper premiums eased lower in northern Europe this past...Read More
Base metals prices on the London Metal Exchange plunged at the 5pm ring close on Wednesday February 7 amid a strong recovery in the dollar leading to copper prices plummeting 2.4%. The three-month copper price declined $196 to close below $7,000 per tonne, hitting a new 2018 low and the lowest since December 19, 2017. "The open of the Chinese night session and Comex saw renewed pressure across the...Read More