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Nickel prices on a roller-coaster ride – by Harold Carmichael (Sudbury Star – April 25, 2020)

https://www.thesudburystar.com/

With so many factors at play around the world, the price of nickel is heading back up after looking to drop below the US $5 a pound mark just a few weeks ago.

The COVID-19 pandemic, of course, has shuttered economies and cut into global demand for nickel. At the same time, Indonesia has banned the export of nickel ore, which will tighten supplies and affect large nickel purchaser China.

On Friday, nickel closed at $5.50 a pound, close to the average world price of nickel in March, which was $5.40 a pound. About three months ago, however, nickel was selling for almost $6.50 a pound.

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Canada Nickel’s Mark Selby sees Dumont-style deposit at Crawford – by Trish Saywell (Northern Miner – April 22, 2020)

https://www.northernminer.com/

Mark Selby led a team that raised over $100 million and advanced the Dumont nickel-cobalt project in Quebec from an initial resource to a fully permitted, construction-ready project for RNC Minerals (TSX: RNX).

Now the mining executive believes he’s onto the next big nickel project in Canada with Crawford – a large tonnage nickel-cobalt sulphide discovery, 20 km north of Glencore’s enormous Kidd Creek base metal mine in Ontario’s Timmins camp.

The chairman and CEO of Canada Nickel Company (TSXV: CNC) says there are similarities between Crawford and RNC Minerals’ Dumont project – one of the world’s largest undeveloped nickel sulphide deposits containing about 6.1 billion lb. nickel in proven and probable reserves.

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DeepGreen to make run for battery metals from seafloor – by Cecilia Jamasmie (Mining.com – April 7, 2020)

https://www.mining.com/

DeepGreen Metals, a Canadian start-up planning to extract cobalt and other battery metals from the seafloor, has added a new area to its seabed portfolio, which it believes could potentially help it solve the bottleneck supply of critical battery metals needed for the world’s green energy transition.

The strategic acquisition of Tonga Offshore Mining Limited (TOML), announced Tuesday, gives the Vancouver-based company exploration rights to a third area inside the Clarion-Clipperton Zone (CCZ) in the Pacific Ocean.

The 4,000-kilometre swath of ocean, stretching from Hawaii to Mexico, is known for containing enough nickel, copper, cobalt and manganese to build over 250 million electric vehicle batteries.

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Nickel drilling campaign turns up PGMs: Canada Nickel makes palladium-platinum find near Timmins – by Staff (Northern Ontario Business – April 7, 2020)

https://www.northernontariobusiness.com/

A fledgling junior mining company searching for nickel and cobalt, north of Timmins, has discovered a zone of palladium and platinum.

Canada Nickel Company, a spinoff of Noble Mineral Exploration, announced the discovery after the results came back from a drilling program on their Crawford nickel-cobalt sulphide project, 40 kilometres north of the city.

According to an April 6 news release, this separate zone sits north and next to the nickel sulphide discovery that was made early last year. A first-time resource calculation was posted in early March.

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BofA sees nickel taking big COVID-19 hit – by Henry Lazenby (Mining Journal – April 2020)

https://www.mining-journal.com/

With global GDP forecast to grow at just 0.3% this year, translating into a 2.8% year-on-year contraction to nickel demand, about 150,000 tonnes of surplus metal or 10% of global supply could accumulate.

Industry players including Vale, Sumitomo, Glencore and South32 have all shown concern over nickel fundamentals, prompting production responses that “should ultimately limit the supply overhang”, according to the bank.

“Similar to copper, we therefore believe prices could rally, when a treatment (not necessarily a vaccine) is found or the isolation measures show success,” BofA said.

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Column: Collapsing auto sector a body blow for industrial metals – by Andy Home – Reuters U.K. – March 27, 2020)

https://uk.reuters.com/

LONDON (Reuters) – France’s Recylex has just announced the temporary closure of both its German lead smelter and two battery-recycling plants, one in Germany and one in France.

The decision is due to a “strong drop in demand, especially in the automotive sector, in a context of sharply lower metal prices,” the company said. It will surely not be the last lead producer to mothball its production facilities.

Lead is umbilically tied to the automotive sector. Lead-acid batteries account for around 80% of global usage of the metal. And carmakers just about everywhere have halted their own production lines due to the spread of the coronavirus and the lockdowns on activity that have followed in its wake.

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Glencore shutters Quebec mines; operations in Sudbury continue – by Staff (Sudbury Star – March 27, 2020)

https://www.thesudburystar.com/

Glencore said Thursday its Raglan nickel and Matagami zinc operations in Quebec will be on care and maintenance for the next three weeks. Nickel from Raglan is shipped to Glencore’s Sudbury operations, where it is processed. Operations in Sudbury will continue to run.

“The government of Quebec has ordered all non-essential businesses to close in an attempt to slow the spread of COVID-19. Accordingly, our Raglan (nickel) and Matagami (zinc) operations in Quebec will be on care and maintenance for the next three weeks,” Glencore said in a statement. “In Ontario, the government has issued a similar decree, but mining has been designated an essential business and therefore our assets can continue to operate.”

The company said it is halting operations at its smaller mines around the world due to government restrictions to curb the spread of the coronavirus but added its larger operations were not materially impacted.

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Mincor crowns Kambalda district projects as highest grade nickel sites – by Salomae Haselgrove (Australian Mining – March 25, 2020)

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Mincor Resources has confirmed a 132 per cent increase to its nickel sulphide reserves in the Kambalda district, Western Australia.

Its reserves are now sitting at 65,400 nickel tonnes, which announcement was concurrent to the completion of Mincor’s definitive feasibility study (DFS) for its nickel restart plan.

The DFS confirmed the potential of Mincor nickel operations to become a five-year operation, producing 63,000 tonnes of recovered nickel-in-concentrate.

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Federal judge hands Twin Metals major win in fight over mining near Boundary Waters – by Jennifer Bjorhus (Star Tribune – March 17, 2020)

http://www.startribune.com/

Copper-mining opponents assailed the decision as a “slap in the face.”

A federal judge in Washington, D.C., has dealt a significant blow to environmental groups fighting to protect the Boundary Waters Canoe Area Wilderness from copper-nickel mining in Minnesota.

U.S. District Judge Trevor McFadden ruled that the Trump administration acted within its authority when it reissued two mineral leases for the proposed Twin Metals copper-nickel mine in 2018.

The Obama administration had previously denied the company’s request to renew its two leases to mine on 5,000 acres of public land in Superior National Forest after the U.S. Forest Service concluded that copper mining so close to the Boundary Waters was too risky, and it could cause “serious and irreparable harm” to an “irreplaceable wilderness area.”

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No plans to shutter Vale or Glencore operations in Sudbury due to COVID-19 – by Harold Carmichael (Sudbury Star – March 18, 2020)

https://www.thesudburystar.com/

Vale has no plans to curtail or suspend its Greater Sudbury-area operations due to the coronavirus pandemic.

“There has been no discussion of suspending operations in our North Atlantic Operations other than Voisey’s Bay and that there have been no confirmed cases of COVID-19 amongst Vale employees to date,” Vale spokeswoman Danica Pagnuti said Tuesday. “In terms of Vale’s efforts to address COVID-19, since late January Vale has been taking all necessary measures to support the prevention of the COVID-19 at its sites. “

Pagnutti said a technical crisis committee and another executive committee were created to manage the actions resulting from this pandemic. To ensure everyone’s safety, all worldwide non-essential business trips have been cancelled or postponed until further notice, and the same approach is being taken for events.

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Vale ramping down operations at Voisey’s Bay (CBC News Newfoundland-Labrador – March 17, 2020)

https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/newfoundland-labrador/

Safety of remote Indigenous communities top of mind, company says

Brazilian mining giant Vale is placing its Labrador nickel mine under “care and maintenance” protocols for the next four weeks amid concerns about COVID-19.

The remote mine, just south of Nain on the northern coast of Labrador, has about 900 workers on site. It is accessible only by air, and has employees from all over Canada.

No employees have tested positive for the virus, but the company said it was taking steps to keep it that way.

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ALX encouraged by nickel, copper mineralization at Falcon project in Saskatchewan – by Valentina Ruiz Leotaud (Mining.com – March 17, 2020)

https://www.mining.com/

ALX Resources (TSXV: AL) intersected nickel and copper mineralization in the second hole of the 2020 drilling program at its Falcon nickel project located in the northern Athabasca region of Saskatchewan, Canada.

In a media statement, ALX explained that its second drill hole on the V-1 conductive target proximal to the historical Currie Lake deposit area completed to a depth of 108 metres intersected sulphide mineralization beginning at a depth of 47.03 metres continuing to 67.89 metres.

“The presence of nickel and copper mineralization in hole FN20-002 has been confirmed by the use of a portable X-ray fluorescence device on the drill core, which is currently being logged and sampled,” the media brief reads.

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JPMorgan Reaped $100 Million as China Squeezed Niche Nickel Market – by Alfred Cang, Jack Farchy and Mark Burton (Bloomberg News – March 11, 2020)

https://www.bloomberg.com/

JPMorgan Chase & Co. made about $100 million trading nickel last year, according to people familiar with the situation, as it benefited from a price spike on the back of a Chinese-led supply squeeze.

The blowout year in nickel underscores JPMorgan’s growing dominance in a corner of the commodities markets that rivals have retreated. The bank has become the go-to financier for big deals in base metals, from the Chinese nickel purchases that sparked last year’s price surge, to hedging transactions for carmakers, which need the metal for electric-vehicle batteries. A spokesman for JPMorgan declined to comment.

Nickel, usually a niche market dominated by stainless steel mills, became the world’s hottest metal in 2019 when prices jumped by two-thirds in a matter of months.

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Global nickel production to decline significantly in 2020 – Fitch Solutions – by Simone Liedike (MiningWeekly.com – March 6, 2020)

https://www.miningweekly.com/

Research agency Fitch Solutions expects global nickel production to decrease significantly over the course of this year, as major producer Indonesia’s nickel ore export ban comes into effect.

The ban in Indonesia was announced in September 2019, bringing it forward to go into effect from January this year instead of January 2022. As a result, Fitch expects global nickel ore production to decrease by 60% year-on-year to 269-million tonnes this year.

This compares with the agency’s previous forecast of 15% growth in global nickel ore output this year. Production growth in the Philippines, where some currently suspended mines will become operational again as the country aims to plug the supply gap caused by the Indonesian export ban, will offset the lower Indonesian output to some extent.

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Canada Nickel expands Crawford holdings (Mining.com – March 4, 2020)

https://www.mining.com/

Shortly after releasing a maiden resource for its wholly-owned Crawford nickel-cobalt sulphide project near Timmins, Ontario, Canada Nickel (TSXV: CNC) has announced an agreement with Noble Mineral Exploration to acquire one additional property and entered into option agreements on five additional holdings nearby.

“Given our demonstrated success at Crawford, this transaction provides us the larger footprint to fully develop Crawford, along with additional exploration targets, which can potentially host nickel-cobalt deposits that are similar to Crawford,” Mark Selby, Canada Nickel’s chairman and CEO, said in a release.

The company has agreed to pay Noble C$500,000 and issue 500,000 of its shares to acquire the 49-sq.-km Crawford Annex holding with a further option to acquire up to an 80% interest in five additional target areas within a land package covering 706 sq. km.

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