The AOCE and WB have moderate overall forecasts for the metals in 2025 inline with IMF forecasts for a decline in economic growth and inflation, although we see the probability of a stagflationary scenario as still reasonably high.Read More

The past year was a difficult one overall for the metals, with the main standouts to the upside being a geopolitical risk-driven gain in gold, a China-driven rise in iron ore and a surge in uranium on broadening global support for nuclear power (Figure 1). A jump in global interest rates to near two-decade highs saw recession fears persist all year, and while one still did not actually eru...Read More

This year the post-global health crisis boom was brought to an end by a surge in inflation to forty-year highs, a major rise in global interest rates in an attempt to curb the rising prices and surging geopolitical risk after Russia's invasion of Ukraine. While precious metals held up reasonably well as markets turned to them as a risk hedge, by Q2/22 the higher interest rates put an end t...Read More

Chile is the world leader in copper production, at 28.5% of the total in 2020, and this looks set to continue, with the country having the largest global reserves, at 23.0% of total. It is also the global leader for molybdenum, which is often found along with copper, and is a major lithium player, holding 51.1% of global reserves. Read More

Newfoundland has become a gold exploration hotspot over the past few years, with the sector seeing some of its strongest activity ever. While the province remains a small contributor to Canadian gold production, it has a substantial mineral industry well supported by the government, focused on iron ore, copper and nickel, and the surge in exploration suggests that gold output from the...Read More

Nevada is the core of the U.S. gold output, accounting for by far the majority, at 75.4% on average for the past year. The state looks set to remain a dominant player in U.S. gold, as it accounts for 49% of total U.S. reserves, with Alaska slightly ahead with 51% of reserves, but just 8.6% of current production. The U.S. accounts for 6.1% of global gold output, making Nevada one of the largest gol...Read More

The Golden Triangle in northwestern British Columbia has historically been a major site of Canadian gold production, beginning as early as the mid 1800s. There was a wave of production in the 1990s which cooled as the gold price declined, but larger scale production resumed in 2017, and the area has seen surging exploration interest over the past year, given that the region has some of the largest...Read More

In this report we outline the Quebec gold mining industry, including its major producers, and a survey of many of the junior miners focused on the province. Quebec accounts for 34% of Canadian gold production (second to Ontario, with 44%) and remains a major focus for both producers and junior miners.Read More

Red Lake has been one of the most prolific gold mining districts in Canada and the world, with exploration having started in the 1920s, and production, which began in the 1930s, continuing to the present day. The district is known for the high grade of its gold, its infrastructure, and strong institutional support, given the long history of mining in the area.Read More

World’s Oldest Gold Object May Have Just Been Unearthed in Bulgaria ... A small gold bead shows that Copper Age people in the Balkans were processing gold 6,500 years ago... -SmithsonianThis gold bead further confirms the maturity of private monetary history in our view.Reference.com tells us, HERE: "The existence of gold has been known for over 5,500 years; therefore, the exact locatio...Read More

Canadian junior Strongbow Exploration Inc (CVE:SBW) last month closed the acquisition of the South Crofty tin mine in Cornwall and local media reports operations could restart within two years.South Crofty, approximately 390km drive west of London on the Celtic Sea Coast, was the last tin mine in Europe when it closed in 1998. Several companies attempted to revive the mines between 2001 and 20...Read More

Every junior commodity market has its share of pretenders to go along with the contenders as prices and demand move up.In striking contrast to internationally traded bellwether metals such as copper and gold, the market for lithium is murky. Analysts have noted recent variances in spot prices in China ranging to $20,000 a tonne. There's barely a handful of producers and buyers and a popular produc...Read More

A Nobel Alternative to the Current Euro System ... A new book by Nobel prize-winning economist Joseph Stiglitz suggests that the best way forward for the euro area is a “flexible euro,” a system of different currencies under the same name fluctuating within certain limits. It’s a new, ingenious riff on an idea that keeps popping up in discussions of the currency bloc’s...Read More

OLYMPICS Shaming Could Be the Best Fix for Olympic Doping ... At the Olympics, we're witnessing some serious cases of public shaming. Victorious competitors are publicly ostracizing those who once used performance-enhancing drugs. To take just one example, Australian Mack Horton, gold medalist in the 400-meter freestyle, pointedly refused even to acknowledge China's silver medalist Sun Yang, who h...Read More

A Nobel Alternative to the Current Euro System ... A new book by Nobel prize-winning economist Joseph Stiglitz suggests that the best way forward for the euro area is a “flexible euro,” a system of different currencies under the same name fluctuating within certain limits. It’s a new, ingenious riff on an idea that keeps popping up in discussions of the currency bloc’s...Read More

OLYMPICS Shaming Could Be the Best Fix for Olympic Doping ... At the Olympics, we're witnessing some serious cases of public shaming. Victorious competitors are publicly ostracizing those who once used performance-enhancing drugs. To take just one example, Australian Mack Horton, gold medalist in the 400-meter freestyle, pointedly refused even to acknowledge China's silver medalist Sun Yang, who h...Read More

Gold has enjoyed its best first half of the year performance since 1908 and silver's 48% surge is a big swing even for such a volatile metal, but the 2016 rally in industrial metals has been just as remarkable.Base metals are showing across the board gains year-to-date. Bellwether copper has been unable to break $5,000 decisively but is still ahead year-to-date while the likes of zinc (+41% at $2,...Read More

According to the World Bank, together the BRIC nations (Brazil, Russia, India and China) consume 40% of global energy and food commodities and over half of the world's metals. China alone accounted for virtually all the increase in metals (aluminum, copper, lead, nickel, tin and zinc) consumption of the BRICs since 1994.India's consumption of metals almost doubled over the past 20 years. But it's...Read More

Mining and commodities giant Glencore (LON:GLEN) is not selling its Lomas Bayas copper mine, after offers for the property in Chile's Atacama desert came in below expectations according to media reports.Reuters reports the mine was expected to fetch about $500 million, but "according to people familiar with the situation" Glencore is ditching disposal plans for the moment partly because even aft...Read More

An increased number of mergers and acquisitions in the mining industry was the main reason why more than 10% of the companies listed on the Toronto Stock Exchange and Toronto Venture Exchange vanished between 2014 and 2015, a new report shows.According to Ernst & Young's latest study, 49 mining and metals companies delisted from the TSX and TSX-V in 2014 and a further 172 companies delisted in 20...Read More

Shares in Ivanhoe Mines (TSX: IVN) were up more than 3.6% Thursday morning after the Canadian miner released fresh drilling results from the Kakula section at its giant Kamoa copper project in Congo, which the company says could prove the discovery to be Africa's most significant deposit of the red metal ever found."Given the remarkable exploration success we have had to date at the Kakula Discove...Read More

Central banks are printing money as though the global economy is in freefall ... Central banks around the world are now spending $200 billion a month on emergency economic stimulus measures, pumping this money into their economies by buying bonds. The current pace of purchases is higher than ever before, even during the depths of the financial crisis in 2009. -QuartzFrom Quartz we learn that centr...Read More

Air Force Seeks New Land-Based and Air-Launched Nukes ... Advancing what could become a near-total rebuild of the U.S. nuclear weapons arsenal, the Air Force ... solicited industry proposals to build a new fleet of land-based nuclear missiles as well as replacements for its air-launched nuclear cruise missile force. The two projects are part of a broader modernization of the nuclear arsenal expe...Read More

Central banks are printing money as though the global economy is in freefall ... Central banks around the world are now spending $200 billion a month on emergency economic stimulus measures, pumping this money into their economies by buying bonds. The current pace of purchases is higher than ever before, even during the depths of the financial crisis in 2009. -QuartzFrom Quartz we learn that centr...Read More

Air Force Seeks New Land-Based and Air-Launched Nukes ... Advancing what could become a near-total rebuild of the U.S. nuclear weapons arsenal, the Air Force ... solicited industry proposals to build a new fleet of land-based nuclear missiles as well as replacements for its air-launched nuclear cruise missile force. The two projects are part of a broader modernization of the nuclear arsenal expe...Read More

UK & EU Shut Out 3D Printing Community ... It's amazing what an eruption Brexit had in the headlines, only to be superseded by worse things in the news shortly after ... What an interesting law they have chosen to pass. -3DPrintThe disease of government is like an ineradicable plague that sickens without ceasing. Now patent and copyright law have been extending in the UK and EU.Why should we...Read More

To commemorate the seventieth anniversary of the first Bikini Atoll nuclear tests, the nonprofit National Security Archive has published declassified footage of the Able and Baker “shots” in the summer of 1946. -Maritime ExecutiveThese new photos and films of the Bikini Atoll atom bomb blast seem artifical.The most obvious, apparent fakery can be seen in the "Baker" atom-bomb test,...Read More

UK & EU Shut Out 3D Printing Community ... It's amazing what an eruption Brexit had in the headlines, only to be superseded by worse things in the news shortly after ... What an interesting law they have chosen to pass. -3DPrintThe disease of government is like an ineradicable plague that sickens without ceasing. Now patent and copyright law have been extending in the UK and EU.Why should we...Read More

To commemorate the seventieth anniversary of the first Bikini Atoll nuclear tests, the nonprofit National Security Archive has published declassified footage of the Able and Baker “shots” in the summer of 1946. -Maritime ExecutiveThese new photos and films of the Bikini Atoll atom bomb blast seem artifical.The most obvious, apparent fakery can be seen in the "Baker" atom-bomb test,...Read More