Unusual and massive storms flooded Chile's Atacama Desert, heart of the country's copper industry, in March last year. (Image: Screenshot via YouTube)The El Ni??o weather event, considered one of the strongest in almost two decades due to droughts caused in Asia and South America, as well as flooding and cyclones in Australia last year, has already peaked and it is likely to be followed by the opp...Read More
Mining companies like Teck Resources (TSX:TCK.B) and Thompson Creek Metals (TSX:TCM) may need to make some hard decisions in 2016 if they are to avoid solvency problems in 2017, warns the Bank of Merrill Lynch.In a recent outlook, Merrill Lynch singled out these two B.C. miners for solvency issues in 2017, and flagged First Quantum Minerals Ltd. (TSX:FQM) for solvency problems in 2018, based on co...Read More
Oracle Mining Corp. (TSX-V:OMN), a Vancouver-headquartered junior mining company focused on a single copper project in Arizona, has gone into receivership, is now halted from trading and its directors and chief executive officers have resigned en masse.Oracle, which has been focused on reviving an idled copper-silver mine-the Oracle Ridge mine near Tucson-has had financial problems since 2014.The...Read More
Image from archives.Global stock markets fell Monday as worries over China's economy and instability in the Middle East combined to scare investors.Chinese bourses tumbled 6.9% in their opening session of 2016, its biggest decline on record for the first trading day of the year, forcing exchanges to halt trade for the first time.This so called "circuit breaker" mechanism, which halts trade for 15...Read More
One of the hardest things for a mining executive to do may be nothing. But in a market that is not rewarding companies for pulling resources out of the ground, Sprott US Holdings Inc. CEO Rick Rule would prefer to see what he calls "optionality" rather than dilution from companies looking to justify salaries. In this interview with The Gold Report, he praises innovative precious metals streams on...Read More
Bill Bennett.Energy and Mines Minister Bill Bennett rang in 2016 with thoughts of a potential rescue package for B.C.'s beleaguered mining industry on his mind to ward off potential mine shutdowns.Options for assistance to mining companies struggling with low commodity prices could include deferrals on payment of power bills and delayed payments on mineral taxes, Bennett said in an interview. Ther...Read More
Despite the ongoing and deepening bear market for commodities and the junior resource sector, MercenaryGeologist.com continues to produce valuable analysis and research on commodities and equities. Our commitment to supply and demand fundamentals and contrarianism allows us to prosper in both good and bad markets.In 2015, the TSX Venture Index made its high of 707 on the year's first trading day...Read More
Mining companies in British Columbia may be able to defer paying their electricity bills, the Mines Minister Bill Bennett tells NEWS 1130.Given low commodity prices and the general struggles of the resource industry, Bennett said mining companies could escape expected Hydro bill rate hikes in 2016 if all "the pieces can be put together.""There might be a deferral opportunity for power costs for th...Read More
Osisko Resources owns 16.2% of the Quebec gold junior Falco Resources (TSX-V:FPC) after purchasing 5.9 million shares for $1.88 million.Falco Resources' Horne Project area in Rouyn-Noranda encompasses the former producing Horne and Quemont mines, according to information on the company's website. The Horne mine, discovered by EH Horne in 1920 and operated by Noranda from 1926 to 1976, was one of t...Read More
Chuquicamata, the world's largest open pit copper mine. (Courtesy of Codelco via Flickr)Chile, the world's top copper producing country, surprised investors by publishing for the first time ever detailed data related to costs for nearly its entire mining industry.According to the recently launched "Costs Observatory," the average cash cost per pound of copper produced in the country during the sec...Read More
Last week we showed you where the wettest mines in the world are located. Topping that list is the Ok Tedi mine in Papua New Guinea where an average of 6,636 millimetres of rain falls each year. This week we're looking at the driest mines in some of the most arid regions of the world. Nearly half the mines on this list get no precipitation at all.Visit IntelligenceMine and learn how you can run yo...Read More
Freeport-McMoRan's Tyrone mine in New Mexico.Shares in Freeport-McMoRan (NYSE:FCX) were trading more than 7.5% lower on Monday morning at about $7 after the company announced its co-founder James Moffett was stepping down as chairman and quitting the board.The move comes a few months after the world's largest publicly traded copper producer added two new directors under pressure from billionaire...Read More
MMG's gigantic Las Bambas mine is the largest China-backed mining projects scheduled to come on stream in Peru next year.Mining projects worth more than $56 billion are expected to come on stream in Peru beginning next year, led mostly by Chinese, American and Canadian companies.According to the official Andina news agency (in Spanish), there are 47 ventures in the last stages of development in th...Read More
The bottom has fallen out of the commodities market and while Canadian mining firms look set to ride it out, there could be a hit to Canada's economy because of low metals and minerals prices.At the end of December:coal is down 32 per cent from its price at the end of last year;iron ore, -24 per cent;palladium, -30 per cent;copper, -25 per cent;zinc, -30 per cent;aluminum, -19 per cent.They're a...Read More
For one of the oldest and most successful teams in Formula One racing, the 2015 season was a big disappointment for McLaren.The team that made Ayrton Senna and Alain Prost into champions finished second-bottom in the 2015 constructor's championship and didn't get a driver on to the podium once in 19 races.But then again, McLaren has more to focus on these days than just the Formula One circus.The...Read More
Discuss: "2016 is going to be a great year for mining" In our look back at 2015 we called it mining's annus horribilis.In stead of the hoped for rebound in metals and minerals prices, just about everything from copper to crude and coal to diamonds lost more ground. Those that were calling a bottom on the commodities market in 2015 where sorely disappointed and anyone making a bullish case were sh...Read More
Mining companies and their shareholders have come to the realization that doing the right things in the communities where they operate is important for a lot of reasons, including the bottom line. Mining executives also tell The Gold Report that the most effective corporate social responsibility programs (CSR) are orchestrated cooperatively instead of applied prescriptively.In 2014 Endeavour Silve...Read More
Investors returned to the metals and mining sector in a big way on Wednesday after good news from the world's two largest economies and metals consumers.Yesterday, Chinese leaders paved the way for a raft of measures to stimulate the country's slowing economy while growth figures in the US, although modest came in ahead of expectations.On the Comex market in New York copper for delivery in March c...Read More
Ready for a Shanghai surprise?China's leaders in October outlined the direction of the world's second largest economy over the next five years.The country's 13th five-year plan running from 2016 - 2020 is the first one approved by Xi Jinping who led a group on "comprehensively deepening reforms" to overhaul China's investment-led economy into one driven by services and consumption.The communique i...Read More
Courtesy of: Visual CapitalistWeeks ago we were delighted to attend an investment conference in San Francisco called The Silver Summit & Resource Expo.Speakers included well-known voices in the investment community such as Grant Williams, Frank Holmes, Frank Trotter, and Rick Rule. The show was also supplemented with people that have helped to build multi-billion companies: precious metals pioneer...Read More