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Australia/New Caledonia/Papua New Guinea Mining

NEWS RELEASE: Wyloo Metals commits to world-class Future Metals Hub in Ontario (May 31, 2021)

PERTH, Australia, May 31, 2021 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) — As part of its long-term investment strategy in the Ring of Fire, Wyloo Metals Pty Ltd (“Wyloo Metals”) is committed to developing a sustainable and world-class Future Metals Hub in Ontario that will create new industry and employment opportunities across the region.

The proposed Future Metals Hub will be developed in consultation with regional stakeholders and First Nations communities to create battery material supply chain capabilities that maximize and retain the value generated from resource development within Ontario.

This announcement follows Wyloo Metals’ statement on Tuesday, May 25, 2021 regarding its intention to make an offer to acquire all of the outstanding common shares of Noront Resources Ltd. (TSXV:NOT) (“Noront”) that it does not currently own.

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Iron ore tycoon pleads with west to mend its relationship with China – by Jamie Smyth (Financial Times – March 24, 2021)

https://www.ft.com/

Australia’s richest man has implored politicians to reject Trumpian populism and rebuild the west’s fractured relationship with China to avoid damaging the global economy and environment.

Andrew Forrest, founder of Fortescue, the world’s fourth biggest iron ore miner, accused populist politicians of dividing people, ripping nations apart and destroying humanity’s ability to leave the world in a better place than they found it.

If asked by the Australian government, he would play a role in helping to heal the worst breakdown in diplomatic relations between Beijing and Canberra in generations, he told the Financial Times in an interview.

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Australians look to go all-in on the Ring of Fire – by Staff (Northern Ontario Business – May 25, 2021)

https://www.northernontariobusiness.com/

Wyloo Metals makes take-over bid for Noront Resources

Noront Resources largest shareholder, Australia’s Wyloo Metals, intends to make a bid to acquire the Ring of Fire mine developer.

Perth, Australia-headquartered Wyloo Metals announced May 25 that it intends to make an offer to acquire all of the outstanding common shares in Noront that it does not currently own in a proposed $133-million deal.

Privately-held Wyloo made its initial buy-in last December, through a subsidiary company, Wyloo Canada Holdings, taking a 23 per cent stake of Noront’s common shares.

Wyloo is owned by Australian mining and green energy billionaire Andrew Forrest and his privately-held investment company Tattarang. Wyloo succeeded Resources Capital Fund as Noront’s biggest shareholder.

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Forrest in $142m takeover bid for Canadian nickel player – by Brad Thompson (Australian Financial Review – May 26, 2021)

https://www.afr.com/

Andrew Forrest has launched a takeover bid that will give him control of a high-grade nickel project in Canada as he looks to establish himself in the region and become a major force in battery metals independent of his multi-billion dollar iron ore interests.

The takeover bid, made through the Forrest family’s private investment arm Tattarang, values Noront Resources at $C133 million ($142.3 million) and comes six months after Dr Forrest grabbed control of a nearly 37 per cent stake in Noront through a deal with Resource Capital Fund.

Toronto Stock Exchange-listed Noront’s assets include Canada’s highest grade nickel discovery since Vale-owned Voisey’s Bay. The Forrest camp has signalled it is willing to bankroll development of the discovery along with other projects in a region known as the Ring of Fire.

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The story of Rum Jungle: a Cold War-era uranium mine that’s spewed acid into the environment for decades – by Gavin Mudd (The Conversation – May 18, 2021)

https://theconversation.com/

Gavin Mudd is the Associate Professor of Environmental Engineering, RMIT University.

Buried in last week’s budget was money for rehabilitating the Rum Jungle uranium mine near Darwin. The exact sum was not disclosed.

Rum Jungle used to be a household name. It was Australia’s first large-scale uranium mine and supplied the US and British nuclear weapons programs during the Cold War.

Today, the mine is better known for extensively polluting the Finniss River after it closed in 1971. Despite a major rehabilitation project by the Commonwealth in the 1980s, the damage to the local environment is ongoing.

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Australian Government commits $20m to resources strategy (Australian Mining – May 10, 2021)

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The Australian Government has unveiled a $20 million Global Resources Strategy to expand the reach and reputation of the country’s resources industry.

Federal Minister for Resources, Water and Northern Australia Keith Pitt said the strategy would assist Australia’s resource sector in supplying to new global markets during the world’s recovery from COVID-19.

“Australia’s resources sector more than lived up to its reputation as a dependable, resilient and efficient supplier of major commodities to the world throughout the COVID-19 pandemic,” Pitt said.

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Reformed iron ore miners tipped to pay $65b dividend – by Peter Ker (Australian Financial Review – May 12, 2021)

https://www.afr.com/

Rio Tinto and BHP are tipped to pass 95 per cent of the iron ore boom back to shareholders through dividends, as Anglo American and Hong Kong’s Cheung Kong became the lastest multinationals to flirt with the idea of building a new iron ore province in Australia’s mid-west.

Iron ore prices have surged 20 per cent above the 2011 record over the past fortnight and are dragging Australia’s biggest exporter, Rio, into a net cash position just 13 years after it was crippled with debt on the back of the disastrous $US38 billion Alcan acquisition.

Shareholder returns from Rio, BHP and Fortescue will be far more generous than in 2011, when the three miners had big plans to spend on growth and were carrying much bigger debt loads.

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Australia announces A$100m commitment to junior mining exploration – by Mariaan Webb (MiningWeekly.com – May 5, 2021)

https://www.miningweekly.com/

Australian Resources Minister Keith Pitt on Wednesday announced a A$100-million funding boost for exploration, extending the junior minerals exploration incentive (JMEI) for another four years in a move to attract new investors.

The JMEI, which allows eligible companies to access tax incentives, encourages companies to explore for resources in untapped areas of Australia. To date, it has supported 85 junior exploration companies, half of which are headquartered in Western Australia.

“We need to ensure that we have a continuous investment pipeline for development across regional Australia,” said Pitt. “Our successful, stable and secure resources sector is underpinned by our world-class junior explorers.”

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If Papua New Guinea really is part of Australia’s ‘family’, we’d do well to remember our shared history – by Patricia A. O’Brien (The Conversation – April 8, 2021)

https://theconversation.com/

Prime Minister Scott Morrison is fond of describing Papua New Guinea as “family”. He did so recently when announcing Australia’s assistance with PNG’s COVID-19 outbreak.

The urgent support for PNG in the form of vaccines, testing kits, medical personnel and training was “in Australia’s interests”, Morrison said, because it threatens the health of Australians, “but equally our PNG family who are so dear to us”.

These familial bonds are “born of history and geography”. PNG is Australia’s closest neighbour. Only 4 kilometres separate the two countries in the Torres Strait, a fluid border that has been redefined numerous times (most recently in 1985). It is currently closed due to the COVID outbreak.

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In Mount Isa, electric cars are driving the economy — but not the people – by Eric Barker (Australian Broadcasting Corporation – April 28, 2021)

https://www.abc.net.au/

Couple some of Australia’s roughest and most remote roads with lucrative mining salaries and you can imagine the size of the cars driving around Mount Isa.

The town’s serenity is often cancelled out by loud diesel engines shifting through the gears, with the noise of Mount Isa Mines in the background.

Ironically, a recent resurgence in the local economy is largely thanks to the burgeoning electric car industry, which is creating some serious demand for copper.

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Anglo American restarts Queensland coal mine amid union backlash – by Cecilia Jamasmie (Mining.com – April 23, 2021)

https://www.mining.com/

Anglo American (LON: AAL) has been granted approvals to allow workers to re-enter the Grosvenor coal mine in Queensland, Australia, almost a year after an explosion seriously injured five workers.

The underground mine has been closed since the methane explosion in May last year, the second incident in the area in less than 15 months.

Workers belonging to the CFMEU Mining and Energy union did not welcome the news. They say the miner had kept its workers fully informed of its plans to restart the underground mine.

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Rudd calls for super profits tax on big iron ore miners – by Peter Ker (Australian Financial Review – April 22, 2021)

https://www.afr.com/

Iron ore miners are ripping off taxpayers amid buoyant commodity prices and should face the type of levy they successfully scuttled a decade ago, according to former prime minister Kevin Rudd.

Renewed calls for a super-profit tax of the type that triggered Mr Rudd’s political downfall in 2010 came as prices for iron ore surged again to within striking distance of a record.

A breach of the $US193 a tonne record set on February 16, 2011, was “absolutely possible” in the near future, according to NAB’s head of commodity research Lachlan Shaw, with futures prices suggesting there could be further gains on Tuesday evening’s price of $US189.61 a tonne.

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New lithium giant emerges to feed surging battery demand – by James Thornhill (Bloomberg News – April 19, 2021)

https://www.bnnbloomberg.ca/

A planned US$3.1 billion merger of two Australian miners is set to create one of the world’s biggest producers of lithium products key to meeting fast-growing global demand for electric vehicle batteries.

The deal between Orocobre Ltd. and Galaxy Resources Ltd. is the biggest mining sector deal of the year so far, according to Bloomberg data, with shares of both companies closing at the highest in three years in Sydney.

The merger would create the world’s fifth-biggest producer of lithium chemicals, the refined form of the raw materials that are used to make electric vehicle batteries.

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Trafigura Bets on Green-Nickel Squeeze in Defiance of China Cure – by Yvonne Yue Li and Andy Hoffman (Bloomberg News – April 20, 2021)

https://www.bnnbloomberg.ca/

(Bloomberg) — Just weeks after a novel production method upended the nickel market, two of the top names in the battery-supply chain made a play that suggests the world’s worries over sourcing cheap, clean supplies of the metal are far from over.

Commodity trader Trafigura Group and Elon Musk’s Tesla Inc. signed a deal in late March to enter the Goro mine in New Caledonia, part of a group that will take the operation off the hands of Vale SA. The transaction wasn’t a surprise, with Vale in talks to offload the under-performing mine for months. But the deal’s timing was telling.

Earlier the same month, China’s Tsingshan Group triggered the biggest two-day nickel rout in a decade with its plans to make battery-grade metal from materials previously reserved only for stainless steel, potentially flooding the market. Wall Street banks lowered their nickel forecasts after futures plunged from about $19,000 a ton to $16,000.

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Barrick Gold lost its ‘social licence’ in Papua New Guinea. This is the price it’s paying to earn it back – by Gabriel Friedman (Financial Post – April 15, 2021)

https://financialpost.com/

Mining executives often talk about the importance of having a ‘social licence’ to operate, yet it’s rare to hear them acknowledge when they don’t have one.

Barrick Gold Corp.’s chief executive Mark Bristow says it happened to his company in Papua New Guinea, where its Porgera mine had been pumping out gold for nearly three decades, even as a spate of accusations about human rights and environmental abuses in the surrounding communities have festered.

Ultimately, last April, Barrick was forced to put the mine on care and maintenance, essentially ceasing operations, when the government declined to renew its permit. Since then, Bristow has made countless trips to the island nation to meet with Prime Minister James Marape, including four since December.

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