Republic of Mining

Amplats’ Griffith convinced of Rustenburg sale – by Allan Seccombe (Miningmx.com – July 8, 2014)

July 8, 2014

http://www.miningmx.com/

[miningmx.com] – THE longest mining strike in South Africa’s history has forced the country’s platinum producers to consider accelerating plans to move to smaller, more productive workforces.

According to them, there’s simply no other way of coping with a volatile, unpredictable labour environment, a business restraint which is compounded by the increasingly complicated market for their metals.

Anglo American Platinum (Amplats), the world’s largest primary producer of platinum, has been the most outspoken on its plans. After spending most of 2012/13 trying to restructure its Rustenburg assets, it is now in the throes of a company-changing review.

The outcome is largely expected to see it cast off the deep-level, labour-intensive mines where the sweetest parts of the orebody have been mined out.

“Amplats’ non-core Western Limb assets, Union, and some of its marginal Rustenburg shafts may well be divested by the group in time,” JP Morgan Cazenove’s Allan Cooke and Steve Shepherd said in a recent report.

Australian nickel projects on sale – by Lawrence Williams (Mineweb.com – July 7, 2014)

July 8, 2014

http://www.mineweb.com/

Western Australian nickel assets owned by two of the world’s largest producers of the metal have been sold or are currently up for sale and attracting much interest.

LONDON (MINEWEB) – Australian nickel projects, presumably deemed non-core businesses, by mining majors BHP Billiton, and Norilsk Nickel are either reportedly up for sale, or sales have been agreed, which will see some of the country’s nickel production, or potential output move into the hands of new ownership. Australia was the world’s fourth largest nickel producer (after the Philippines, Indonesia and Russia) in 2012.

BHP Billiton, which had previously sold off its Ravensthorpe nickel mine and metallurgical plant to First Quantum back in December 2009 for $340 million – having cost over $2 billion to build – is now looking to sell the rest of its Western Australian nickel operations which come under its Nickel West banner, comprising the Mount Keith Nickel mine, Leinster Nickel mine, Kambalda Nickel concentrator, Kalgoorlie Nickel rmelter and Kwinana Nickel refinery.

There are reportedly six major potential suitors for the package, including Mick Davis’ X2 Resources. BHP inherited its nickel mining operations through the take-over of Western Mining in 2005.

Simultaneously, Norilsk Nickel the world’s largest nickel producer, has announced that through its Australian subsidiaries, MPI Nickel and Black Swan Nickel it has agreed to sell its Black Swan/Silver Swan assets, also located in Western Australia and currently under care and maintenance, to Poseidon Nickel. Norilsk had been reported as planning to sell all of its Australian assets back in May.

Mining for the truth in Guatemala – by Melinda Maldonado (MACLEAN’S Magazine – July 8, 2014)

July 8, 2014

http://www.macleans.ca/

What lawsuits claiming rape and murder in a Guatemalan jungle mean for Canadian companies abroad

Rosa Elbira Coc Ich was warming tortillas when the men came. Their trucks rumbled down the dirt road toward her home, a shack she’d rebuilt in eastern Guatemala after a forced eviction 12 days earlier. It was Jan. 17, 2007, and as hundreds of police, military and private security workers returned, she heard their voices pierce the thick tropical brush as they called out for the leaders of the community.

Nine of the men pushed their way into her home.

“Where’s your husband?” a policeman asked, pressing a gun to her temple, according to documents filed as part of a lawsuit in an Ontario court. When she couldn’t answer, the officer said he was going to kill her. Then the men pushed her to the floor, ripped off her clothes and covered her mouth. Ich claims all nine of them raped her.

Nearby 10 other women from the Mayan Q’eqchi’ community say they experienced the same ordeal—gang rapes at the hands of police, military and private security from the Fenix nickel mine, 300 km northeast of Guatemala City—during evictions from the homes they’d built on the mine’s property.

NEWS RELEASE: Cliffs Natural Resources Inc. Issues Open Letter to Shareholders

July 8, 2014

July 07, 2014

Casablanca’s Nominees, Including Proposed Executive Chairman Lourenco Goncalves, Lack Crucial Industry Experience Needed to Navigate Today’s Volatile Pricing Environment
Cliffs’ Nominees Have the Right Experience to Drive Long-term, Sustainable Growth and Shareholder Value
Recommends Shareholders Vote WHITE Proxy Card Today

CLEVELAND – July 7, 2014 – Cliffs Natural Resources Inc. (NYSE: CLF) today issued the following letter to shareholders in connection with its upcoming 2014 Annual Meeting of Shareholders scheduled to be held on July 29, 2014:
Dear Fellow Cliffs Shareholder,

Cliffs’ Annual Meeting of Shareholders is fast approaching and your vote is extremely important. Your Board of Directors is focused on driving value for all shareholders and continuing to position Cliffs for long-term, sustainable growth.

Your Board urges you to vote the enclosed WHITE proxy card “FOR” Cliffs’ nine highly qualified and experienced nominees: Gary B. Halverson, Barry J. Eldridge, Mark E. Gaumond, Susan M. Green, Janice K. Henry, Stephen M. Johnson, James F. Kirsch, Richard K. Riederer and Timothy W. Sullivan.

By using the WHITE proxy card and voting as recommended by your Board, you will help prevent Casablanca from electing a majority slate and breaking up your Company.

Why gold looks set to lose its shine – by Scott Barlow (Globe and Mail – July 8, 2014)

July 8, 2014

The Globe and Mail is Canada’s national newspaper with the second largest broadsheet circulation in the country. It has enormous influence on Canada’s political and business elite.

The price of gold, the value of the U.S. dollar and inflation are all closely tied, and this can make it difficult to figure out whether the current bullion price is high or low based on history.

The good news is that this problem can be solved by adjusting the gold price for inflation. The bad news is that once this is done, the future does not look bright for gold investors.

Monday’s closing gold spot price was $1,317.11 (U.S.) per ounce. To pick an example from history, the closing gold price for July 7, 1980, was $667.50. The nominal dollar difference is big, but that doesn’t mean much until we adjust for the difference in spending power of the U.S. dollar caused by rising prices.

Because of inflation, the spending power of one U.S. dollar has been more than halved since 1980. So just comparing the nominal price of gold then and now makes no sense. In effect, these are different currencies.

To assess whether gold is more or less expensive now, it is necessary to calculate an inflation-adjusted gold price using the same currency.

U.S. Seen as Biggest Oil Producer After Overtaking Saudi Arabia – by Grant Smith (Bloomberg News – July 4, 2014)

July 8, 2014

http://www.bloomberg.com/

The U.S. will remain the world’s biggest oil producer this year after overtaking Saudi Arabia and Russia as extraction of energy from shale rock spurs the nation’s economic recovery, Bank of America Corp. said.

U.S. production of crude oil, along with liquids separated from natural gas, surpassed all other countries this year with daily output exceeding 11 million barrels in the first quarter, the bank said in a report today. The country became the world’s largest natural gas producer in 2010. The International Energy Agency said in June that the U.S. was the biggest producer of oil and natural gas liquids.

“The U.S. increase in supply is a very meaningful chunk of oil,” Francisco Blanch, the bank’s head of commodities research, said by phone from New York. “The shale boom is playing a key role in the U.S. recovery. If the U.S. didn’t have this energy supply, prices at the pump would be completely unaffordable.”

Oil extraction is soaring at shale formations in Texas and North Dakota as companies split rocks using high-pressure liquid, a process known as hydraulic fracturing, or fracking. The surge in supply combined with restrictions on exporting crude is curbing the price of West Texas Intermediate, America’s oil benchmark. The U.S., the world’s largest oil consumer, still imported an average of 7.5 million barrels a day of crude in April, according to the Department of Energy’s statistical arm.

Environmental group uses poll to battle oil sands PR – by Shawn McCarthy (Globe and Mail – July 4, 2014)

July 8, 2014

The Globe and Mail is Canada’s national newspaper with the second largest broadsheet circulation in the country. It has enormous influence on Canada’s political and business elite.

OTTAWA – A Toronto-based environmental group is challenging the aggressive messaging from the federal government and industry on the economic benefits of the oil sands with the release of a poll that suggests Canadians are ill-informed about the impact of the sector.

In a survey released Friday, Environmental Defence said 57 per cent of respondents overestimated the contribution of the oil sands to the national economy. According to Statistics Canada, oil sands production accounts for 2 per cent of the country’s gross domestic product, but more than 40 per cent of respondents pegged the figure at 12 per cent of GDP or higher.

The environmental group focused on the value of production from existing oil sands projects, but it did not account for current growth and new jobs that result from the construction of new projects or the pipelines and other infrastructure needed to get higher volumes of crude to market.

Prime Minister Stephen Harper and his ministers have routinely characterized the oil sands specifically – the the resource sector generally – as the engine of economic growth for Canada, and warn against any action that would slow down development.

Taseko sees ‘positive future’ for New Prosperity mine after high court ruling – by Gordon Hoekstra (Vancouver Sun – July 6, 2014)

July 7, 2014

http://www.vancouversun.com/index.html

Tsilhqot’in Nation says company is in denial about central-B.C. project, mine is dead

A Supreme Court of Canada decision may have opened the door to a twice rejected gold and copper mine mired in a legal battle.

That’s because the $1.1-billion New Prosperity mine falls outside the 1,750 square kilometres of territory in central B.C. for which the Tsilhqot’in now has title and where consent is needed for industrial projects, says Taseko Mines Ltd.

The aboriginal title question always hung over the project, and now it’s settled, says the company. “It’s the only mine development deposit (in British Columbia) that people now know for sure is not in aboriginal title area,” says Brian Battison, vice-president of corporate affairs for Taseko.

The Tsilhqot’in continue to oppose the project, citing hunting and trapping rights, and admonish the company for continuing to push a project unwanted by First Nations. “I think Taseko has a very twisted view of things. I think it’s very, very irresponsible,” said chief Joe Alphonse, tribal chairman of the Tsilhqot’in.

The continuing dispute over New Prosperity shows how the complex nature of resource development in British Columbia — where aboriginal, industrial, government and local non-native interests often overlap — will continue to pose a challenge despite the landmark Supreme Court of Canada decision.

BHP Billiton looks to catch up to Rio Tinto in ironman contest – by Amanda Saunders (The Age – July 7, 2014)

July 7, 2014

http://www.theage.com.au/business

Miner BHP Billiton is confident it can ”close the gap” with iron ore arch-rival Rio Tinto on margin per tonne within a few years.

And it is likely to develop the $20 billion outer-harbour project at Port Hedland rather than expand its inner-harbour operation if it moves to produce beyond its current annual run rate target of 270 million tonnes. BHP president of iron ore Jimmy Wilson says the miner is trailing Rio on margin per tonne, and ”our desire absolutely is to close that gap”.

He said the miner would never be in a competition with Rio on volumes but stressed ”where we would like to compete is on the cost of production side, more importantly, the margin per tonne that we make”.

”While we are marginally behind Rio at the moment, we’ve got to back the fact that we are going to eliminate that gap in the foreseeable future,” he says.

”What is the foreseeable future? I’d be disappointed if it took more than a couple of years. ”I do respect our competitors – Rio, Fortescue, Vale – [and] none of them is standing still either. So, I think, at the end of the day, you are going to see an improvement come through for all of those businesses.”

Thomas Berger’s latest fight: Keeping the Yukon wilderness wild – by Jason Unrau (Globe and Mail – July 7, 2014)

July 7, 2014

The Globe and Mail is Canada’s national newspaper with the second largest broadsheet circulation in the country. It has enormous influence on Canada’s political and business elite.

It’s been half a lifetime for Thomas Berger since he recommended – successfully – that a proposed pipeline along Yukon’s Beaufort Sea coast be scrapped, and a trunkline from the mouth of the Mackenzie River delta through the Northwest Territories to Alberta be delayed indefinitely.

But the 81-year-old lawyer’s latest interest in Canada’s North is not to weigh mega-project pros and cons, but to test the limits of the government’s authority over Crown land, entwined in a modern land claim in the Yukon known as the Umbrella Final Agreement (UFA).

“My legacy goes a long way back and I won’t be around to know what people make of it,” Mr. Berger said. “But this is a case I agreed as a lawyer to undertake. I think it’s an important case.”

Mr. Berger’s clients – Nacho Nyak Dun and Trodek Hwech’in First Nations, Yukon Conservation Society and CPAWS – are suing the territorial government to try to protect a 68,000-square-kilometre Xanadu of unpopulated wilderness known as the Peel watershed.

Rich in flora and fauna – Trondek Hwech’in Chief Eddie Taylor describes the Peel as a university and a breadbasket for the First Nation – the Peel also possesses incredible mineral and hydrocarbon potential.

How politics nearly ruined deal to end South Africa’s longest strike – by ED CROPLEY, JOE BROCK AND ZANDI SHABALALA (Reuters India – July 7, 2014)

July 7, 2014

http://in.reuters.com/

JOHANNESBURG – (Reuters) – Forty-eight hours after talks to end South Africa’s longest strike hit a brick wall when the mining minister suddenly pulled out, a bishop and an anti-establishment corporate lawyer engineered a deal at a secret meeting in a ritzy hotel.

The events, revealed by interviews with key players in the five-month platinum strike, expose the impotence of the bargaining structures that have underpinned labour relations since the end of white-minority rule in 1994.

They also cast a shadow over the ruling African National Congress (ANC), which admonished the minister for inviting the lawyer to the talks after he had left the ANC to be elected to parliament for the ultra-leftist Economic Freedom Fighters (EFF).

The chastened minister then withdrew from the negotiations, almost scuppering an agreement between the world’s three biggest platinum firms and the striking Association of Mineworkers and Construction Union (AMCU), which has informal ties to the EFF.

“They did not tell me how to withdraw,” the minister, Ngoako Ramatlhodi, told Reuters. “They just told me: ‘We think you have done enough. We want you to go slow on this.'”

Quebec’s Renard diamond mine is a glimmer of hope for slowing industry – by Anna Nicolaou (Globe and Mail – July 7, 2014)

July 7, 2014

The Globe and Mail is Canada’s national newspaper with the second largest broadsheet circulation in the country. It has enormous influence on Canada’s political and business elite.

Something sparkly has caught Quebec’s eye. Nearly a decade after the most precious form of carbon was found in the northern mountains of Quebec, the first diamond mine in Quebec is opening in July. Stornoway Diamond Corp.’s Renard mine, nestled near the Otish Mountains, is projected to produce 1.5 to 2 million carats of diamonds a year.

The opening of Renard comes at a convenient time: Globally, demand for diamonds greatly exceeds supply, largely because few new mines have been discovered recently.

“There’s Renard in Quebec, DeBeers in the Northwest Territories and one pipe in Russia, that’s about it,” said Edward Sterck, diamond analyst at BMO Capital Markets. “And these are not of the same world-class scale as DeBeers in Botswana and Russia, which are now very old and in decline, so… Supply is incredibly limited.”

Diamond prices have crept higher over the past few years as demand flourishes, particularly in emerging markets such as India and China, where the growing middle class seeks luxury goods.

First Perspective columnist [Bill Gallagher] features in CTV news segment – by Trevor Greyeyes (First Perspective – July 7, 2014)

July 7, 2014

http://www.firstperspective.ca/ Bill Gallagher right all along I think the mainstream media in Canada is finally starting to clue in to the fact that Bill Gallagher knows a thing or two about First Nation issues especially when it comes to resource issues. When I first interviewed him about his book “Resource Rulers” a couple of years …

Trafigura Among Six to Enter BHP Nickel Sale, Review Says – by Ben Sharples (Bloomberg News – July 06, 2014)

July 7, 2014

http://www.businessweek.com/

Trafigura Beheer BV and Sherritt International Corp. (S) are among six companies to enter the sale process for BHP Billiton Ltd.’s Australian nickel unit, according to a report from the Australian Financial Review.

Glencore Plc, X2 Resources, Jinchuan Group Co. and MMG Ltd., a unit of China Minmetals Corp., are also among bidders that have started due diligence on BHP’s Nickel West business, the newspaper reported today, without saying where it got the information. Emily Perry, a Melbourne-based spokeswoman for BHP, declined to comment in an e-mailed response.

BHP said in May it’s considering selling all or part of its Australian nickel unit as prices surge amid an Indonesian export ban on the steel hardening agent. The due diligence process may take months and BHP is keen to finalize a deal by the end of the year, the newspaper said. The business may be worth more than A$800 million ($749 million), according to the newspaper.

Michael Oke, a spokesman for London-based X2 Resources, Francis de Rosa, a Sydney-based spokesman for Glencore, and Kathleen Kawecki, a Melbourne-based spokeswoman for MMG, didn’t immediately respond to e-mails sent outside of normal business hours seeking comment on the sale process. Three calls to Gao Tianpeng, the general manager of Jinchuan’s asset operation department, went unanswered.

Amsterdam-based Trafigura and Toronto-based Sherritt didn’t immediately respond to e-mails seeking comment.

Work together on Gateway, for prosperity’s sake – by Mike Harris (Globe and Mail – July 7, 2014)

July 7, 2014

The Globe and Mail is Canada’s national newspaper with the second largest broadsheet circulation in the country. It has enormous influence on Canada’s political and business elite.

Mike Harris, former premier of Ontario, is a senior business adviser at Fasken Martineau and a senior fellow at the Fraser Institute.

Canada is a resource nation. In every region, its natural resource sectors, including mining, forestry, energy and oil and gas, support vital social programs and provide stable, well-paying jobs.

However, regardless of their economic contributions, major infrastructure projects face intense scrutiny – as they should. In order to proceed, these projects must balance economic development with environmental and safety protections.

Consider, as just one example, the Northern Gateway pipeline, recently approved by the federal government. Since being proposed more than a decade ago, the project’s journey hasn’t always been easy. It has faced tough criticism. But thoughtful debate has taken place and ideas have been exchanged that have resulted in a better pipeline proposal.

As a former premier, I know first-hand the experience of fighting for economic development for your province and its people, but not to the detriment of local communities and the environment. Receiving social licence for resource projects must be the leading objective for proponents; public input and consultations are paramount.