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De Beers Cuts Prices of Smaller Rough Diamonds – by Joshua Freedman (Rapaport Magazine – May 7, 2024)

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De Beers has reduced prices for smaller rough diamonds at this week’s sight, with manufacturers saying the adjustments aren’t enough to ease their profitability challenges. The miner cut the price of 3-grainer (0.75-carat) and smaller goods by 4% to 6%, market insiders told Rapaport News Tuesday. In 4- to 6-grainers (1 to 1.5 carats), the price decline was around 4%, they estimated.

Prices of 5- to 10-carat rough increased slightly, though this partly reflected modifications to the assortments, they added. Like-for-like price movements are hard to estimate because changes to the product mix can skew them, the sources cautioned. De Beers declined to comment.

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As gold hovers near record highs, some experts warn against going all in – by Ben Cousins (MSN.com – May 6, 2024)

https://www.msn.com/

With gold hovering near record highs, some experts have warned against diverting savings into the precious metal. In early April, gold reached a new record price just shy of US$2,400 per ounce, and while the price of bullion has since slipped, it has still advanced more than 12 per cent this year.

With prices high, hype surrounding the commodity has remained resilient, and retailers like Costco (COST) are even getting in on the action. According to a report from Wells Fargo, sales of gold bars brought in US$200 million per month to the company.

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Red Pine confirms Wawa gold assays after reported ‘inconsistencies’, stock rebounds – by Staff (Mining.com – May 6, 2024)

https://www.mining.com/

Red Pine Exploration (TSXV: RPX) said on Monday that investigations into past assay results from its Wawa gold project in Ontario found no evidence of inconsistencies, and that the company can rely on the validity of those results.

Last week, the Toronto-based gold junior issued a press release stating that it was withdrawing all previously reported assays from the Wawa project after discovering “inconsistencies” in certain results. A detailed investigation ensued.

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Column: LME checks Russian aluminum play but is it game over? – by Andy Home (Reuters – May 7, 2024)

https://www.reuters.com/

The London Metal Exchange’s (LME) warning shot to those looking to game the new sanctions on Russian aluminum appears to have worked, for now at least. Traders swooped on the LME’s stocks of Russian brand aluminum after the US and UK governments banned exchanges from taking delivery of Russian metal produced after April 12.

Over half of registered tonnage was cancelled over the ensuing week, destined for a creative run-around that would see it re-warranted under more restrictive trading conditions and locked into a lucrative rent-sharing warehouse deal.

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José Raúl Mulino’s presidential win in Panama boosts First Quantum’s Cobre Panama prospects – by Niall McGee (Globe and Mail – May 7, 2024)

https://www.theglobeandmail.com/

The election of a pro-business president in Panama is raising hopes that Canadian miner First Quantum Minerals Ltd.’s pained prospects in the country might improve. First Quantum’s Cobre Panama mine was ordered to close late last year by outgoing president Laurentino Cortizo after the country’s Supreme Court ruled that its mining contract was unconstitutional. Mr. Cortizo’s term ends on June 30.

The winner of Sunday’s election was José Raúl Mulino. His campaign focused heavily on various initiatives aimed at boosting the economy. He became a candidate late in the campaign when former Panamanian president Ricardo Martinelli was barred from running after being convicted of money laundering.

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South African Unions Urge Anglo Shareholders To Reject BHP Bid – by Antony Sguazzin (Bloomberg News – May 7, 2024)

https://www.bnnbloomberg.ca/

(Bloomberg) — South Africa’s biggest labor union federation urged local shareholders, including the powerful Public Investment Corp., to oppose BHP Group Ltd.’s bid to buy Anglo American Plc. The Congress of South African Trade Unions, which includes the National Union of Mineworkers among its members, said a deal wouldn’t be in the national interest. South African shareholders hold about 26% of Anglo, with the PIC owning 8.4%, according to data compiled by Bloomberg.

BHP’s proposal to acquire Anglo on April 25 raised the ire of some members of South Africa’s government, including Mines Minister Gwede Mantashe. The Australian company responded by deploying a senior team including its chief executive officer to South Africa to win over government officials, regulators and local Anglo shareholders.

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[California Lithium-rich Salton Sea] The green treasure below a toxic lake – by Jean-François Bélanger (CBC News – March 31, 2024)

https://www.cbc.ca/newsinteractives/

The place is as little-known as it is majestic. It’s a deep blue lake bordered by the desert and mountain ranges as far as the eye can see. As the largest body of water in California, the Salton Sea used to be a favorite vacation hotspot for Hollywood stars back in the ‘50s and ‘60s. Frank Sinatra, Jerry Lewis and the Marx brothers were among the regulars. The Beach Boys as well.

This is what drew Donna Winters to settle in Desert Shores, about 130 kilometres east of San Diego, a quarter of a century ago. The retiree, in her 80s, keeps very fond memories of her first years here. Her once-lakefront home had stunning views.

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Gold The True Motor Of West African History: An Overview Of The Importance Of Gold In West Africa And Its Relations With The Wider World – by Jan Bart Gewald (Rozenberg Quarterly – 2010)

https://rozenbergquarterly.com/

While the prime sources of gold remained more or less where they had always been, hidden from the outside world, along the headwaters of the Rivers Senegal and Niger (Wright 2007: 21).

Slavery and African slaves have dominated historical perspectives of Africa and its relations with the wider world. Yet, it is gold which has been the most important and enduring element that has shaped and determined West Africa and its interactions with the wider world. For at least 1,500 years gold and not slaves has been the commodity determining not only the region’s economy and history, but also West Africa’s links with the wider world.

Beginning in the late 1700s, understandable humanitarian concerns and philanthropic motives ensured that the focal point within public discussion and history, when dealing with West Africa, came to be centred on the issue of slavery. Focussing on slavery to the detriment of gold and other commodities to some extent ensured that the export of slaves from West Africa came to be halted in the course of the nineteenth century.

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Fire and the mining frontier – by John Sandlos (Canadian Mining Journal – May 5, 2024)

https://www.canadianminingjournal.com/

The massive expansion of Canada’s mining industry in the early twentieth century brought miners into close contact with one of the most fire-prone ecosystems on the planet ― the great boreal forest. Although prospectors sometimes lit fires to clear land for exploration, the smell of smoke and the site of flames more often signaled a mortal threat to new mining communities in northern Canada.

With their hastily constructed wooden buildings, rudimentary fire fighting capabilities, and lack of viable transportation infrastructure, mining communities had almost no defenses against fire. Some fires might start within a town or a mine (such as the July 1909 fire in Cobalt, Ont.), but large forest fires also spelled potential doom for anyone or anything in their pathway.

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What’s Anglo Worth? For Now It’s Less than the Sum of Its Parts – by Mark Burton (Bloomberg News – May 2, 2024)

https://www.bnnbloomberg.ca/

(Bloomberg) — As BHP Group considers its next move, there’s one big question facing the mining world’s bankers, analysts and executives at rival producers: What’s Anglo American Plc actually worth? Anglo’s shares are trading about 8% above the price implied by BHP’s initial proposal, which was swiftly and firmly rejected, and Bloomberg reported on the weekend that the larger firm was considering an improved offer.

But how high can BHP go? The world’s biggest miner needs to thread the needle with an offer that can win over Anglo investors while maintaining the support of its own shareholders — especially given the company’s history of disastrous dealmaking.

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Colombian largest drug cartel extracting gold from protected area – governor – by Staff Writer (Mining.com – May 5, 2024)

https://www.mining.com/

The governor of Colombia’s central-northern department of Santander, Juvenal Díaz, denounced the presence of members of the Gulf Clan, also known as the Gaitanista Army of Colombia (EGC), in the Santurbán moor.

The EGC is a neo-paramilitary group and likely the country’s largest drug cartel, which was created after the demobilization of the United Self-Defense Forces of Colombia. Their presence in Santander is meant to control illegal gold mining operations. According to Díaz – a retired army general turned politician –, the criminals are not only taking over the area but also polluting water sources.

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Meeting the metals mining shortfall – by Wilson Monteiro (Canadian Mining Journal – May 3, 2024)

https://www.canadianminingjournal.com/

Moving away from fossil fuels to meet essential global carbon reduction targets means mining for metals and minerals will need to increase significantly over the coming years. Electric vehicles, wind turbines, solar panels, and overall electrification are all areas of increased demand, meaning metals like copper, iron, and zinc will be continuously required.

How the need for more metals will be met with our current infrastructure is uncertain. Taking copper as an example, production is predicted to reach a crisis point by 2030 with an annual deficit of five million tonnes. Stemming from a surge in demand driven by the exponential growth in electric vehicles and a myriad of other electrification applications, surpassing current production capacity, this is an alarming prognosis that would ultimately impede global sustainability goals.

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China Is Buying Gold Like There’s No Tomorrow – by Daisuke Wakabayashi and Claire Fu (New York Times – May 2024)

https://www.nytimes.com/

The global price of gold has reached its highest levels as Chinese investors and consumers, wary of real estate and stocks, buy the metal at a record pace.

As gold surged this year to its highest price ever, Xena Lin joined the frenzy by making monthly purchases of gold “beans,” pebble-like morsels of the precious metal.

For Ms. Lin, a 25-year-old administrative worker in southern China, the $80 beans — small enough to rest on a fingertip and weighing about one-thirtieth of an ounce — were an affordable way to buy into the gold excitement without splurging for jewelry, gold bars or coins. She had dabbled with investing in stocks in the past, but she said buying gold, especially in this fun way, inspired her to continue investing.

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Trans Mountain reminds us Canada can still be capable of greatness against the odds – by John Ivison (National Post – May 6, 2024)

https://nationalpost.com/

It is the kind of project that Canada no longer seems to be able to build

The completion of the Trans Mountain pipeline expansion (TMX) was not commemorated by an iconic photograph, such as the one taken one a wet November morning in 1885 in the mountains of British Columbia. What Pierre Berton, in his epic story of the building of the country’s first transcontinental railway, billed as The Great Canadian Photograph has a sense of occasion, as a white bearded old gentleman, Canadian Pacific Railway (CPR) director Donald Smith, hammers home an iron railroad spike: The Last Spike.

“Canada had accomplished the impossible — a job done with a remarkable blend of financial acumen, stubborn perseverance, political lobbying, brilliant organization, reckless gambling, plain good fortune and the toil of a legion of ordinary working men … the unknown soldiers of (CPR general manager William) Van Horne’s army,” Berton wrote.

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Europe’s Gathering Storm – by Diane Francis (Substack – May 6, 2024)

https://dianefrancis.substack.com/

French President Emmanuel Macron shocked the world on February 26 by suggesting that Europeans may have to send troops to help Ukraine. Then on May 4, he doubled-down and said French troops would go to Ukraine if Kyiv requested their help. He also described Europe as “mortal” and said that “things can fall apart very quickly” because the US is no longer guarantor of Europe’s security.

“I have a clear strategic objective: Russia cannot win in Ukraine,” Macron said. “If Russia wins in Ukraine, there will be no security in Europe. Who can pretend that Russia will stop there? What security will there be for neighboring countries, Moldova, Romania, Poland, Lithuania and the others?” His clarion call was echoed by the leader of Europe’s other nuclear power, Britain’s Prime Minister Rishi Sunak, who said “if Putin is allowed to succeed in this war of aggression, he will not stop at the Polish border”.

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