Politics and science have combined to wipe $225 an ounce off the price of gold in three weeks with worse to come if peace takes hold in war zones and if an experiment in man-made gold moves out of its laboratory phase.
The fall from a peak of $3433 an ounce on April 22 to around $3208/oz today was caused largely by the promise of peace in Ukraine and Gaza and an easing of tariffs in the U.S. v China trade war.
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President Donald Trump invoked a wartime and emergency law in March to bolster critical materials and rare-earth metals mining production in the U.S.
“The Defense Production Act (DPA) will be used to expand domestic mineral production capacity,” reads the order, referring to the federal law that was established during the Korean War, invoked during the Cold War to help bolster U.S. aluminum and titanium industries, and most recently during the COVID-19 pandemic to increase manufacturing of masks and ventilators.
Now, there could be an effort by Trump to use his emergency powers under the DPA to bolster platinum and palladium mining in Montana and curtail Russian imports of the precious metals. Montana is the only state where platinum and palladium (the latter used mostly in catalytic converters for cars and trucks) is mined.
(Kitco News) – The gold market may be struggling to attract bullish momentum as it remains well below last month’s all-time high of $3,500 an ounce; however, investors are still reluctant to short the precious metal as it continues to hold support at $3,200 an ounce.
In a note on Tuesday, commodity analysts at TD Securities pointed out that gold is still above its lows following President Donald Trump’s “Liberation Day,” when he announced significant global tariffs on imported goods. He later removed the elevated tariffs and implemented a blanket 10% tax on all imports.
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Pan American Silver Corp. has reached a friendly arrangement to buy its Canadian competitor MAG Silver Corp. in a US$2.1-billion stock-and-cash deal that has not gone down well with shareholders. Vancouver-based MAG’s sole producing asset is its 44-per-cent share in the Juanicipio silver mine, which is located in Mexico, and majority-owned and operated by Britain-incorporated Fresnillo PLC.
Founded by financier Ross Beaty, Pan American is one of the biggest silver producers on the planet with a portfolio of 10 mines in seven countries. The Vancouver-based company expanded its footprint considerably a few years ago when it bought a suite of South American mines from Canada’s Yamana Gold Inc.
Rio Tinto (ASX, LON: RIO) is doubling down on lithium, with chief executive Jakob Stausholm declaring that South America’s Lithium Triangle is the ideal region to secure the metal critical to the energy transition.
Speaking at the Bank of America Global Metals, Mining and Steel Conference on Tuesday, Stausholm said that brine resources in Argentina, Chile and Bolivia offer the best chance for the world to access low-cost, high-quality lithium.
https://www.northernontariobusiness.com/
Timmins miner eager to tap into robust Grey Fox deposit sooner than later
How keen are Ottawa and Queen’s Park in working together to accelerate the approvals process that puts more mines into production? McEwen Mining will find out in the months to come. The Toronto gold company has high hopes for its Grey Fox deposit, east of Timmins, which CEO Rob McEwen called a “cornerstone asset for us for years to come,” in a May 7 news release.
The Timmins-area miner recently released the latest batch of high-grade drill hits from an ongoing exploration program at Grey Fox that bolstered management’s confidence that the high-grade deposit only stands to get bigger.
Mining continues at the Continental Pit. Nearby is the Berkeley Pit, a site for acid mine drainage that poses an opportunity for extracting valuable metals.
There’s a tale told about a miner who found copper cans in his garbage dump in the early days of mining. Wastewater from copper mining had flowed through his land, he said, and turned steel cans into copper. The story might be apocryphal, but the process is real, and it’s called cementation. Montana Resources, the mining company that took over from the Anaconda Copper Company, still uses this alchemical trick in a process at its Continental Pit mine in Butte, Mont.
Next to the mine is the Berkeley Pit, which is filled with 50 billion gallons of a highly acidic, toxic brew. Montana Resources pipes liquid from the pit, enabling it to cascade onto piles of scrap iron. The iron becomes copper and is gathered for production.
‘This is a genocide:’ no clean water, healthcare as drug pandemic rages
Neskantaga First Nation Chief Gary Quisess is only six weeks into his first term, and is facing simultaneous crises in his community and in Thunder Bay. But he left home and travelled to Queen’s Park today to call out what he describes as “genocide” buried in new provincial environmental legislation.
Ontario’s proposed Bill 5, the Protect Ontario By Unleashing Our Economy Act, would allow the province to designate “special economic zones” that would qualify to bypass environmental regulations and speed up development. It is expected to be in force as early as September, and Premier Doug Ford intends to name the proposed Ring of Fire mineral development as the first such site.
Syrian leader Ahmed al-Sharaa may offer Washington access to the country’s oil and gas fields, inspired by the recent mineral deal between Ukraine and the United States, according to Reuters and The Times. According to Western media, the Syrian leader may also propose building a Trump Tower in Damascus in honor of the US president.
Additionally, al-Sharaa’s strategic plan reportedly includes efforts to ease tensions with Israel. Several sources familiar with the matter told Reuters that these proposals are part of the Syrian leader’s broader attempt to secure a face-to-face meeting with US President Donald Trump during his upcoming trip to the Middle East.
TORONTO — Honda Canada is postponing a $15-billion electric vehicle investment project in Ontario, including a proposed EV battery plant and retooled vehicle assembly facility.
Honda Canada spokesman Ken Chiu said due to the recent slowdown in the EV market, Honda has announced an approximate two-year postponement of the comprehensive value chain investment project in Canada. “The company will continue to evaluate the timing and project progression as market conditions change,” Chiu said in a statement Tuesday.
The price of gallium has been rising ever since China started restricting exports of the exotic metal in August 2023. This is not surprising since China has a near monopoly on global gallium production, just as it does across the critical materials spectrum.
How much should we care that the price of something most people have never heard of is trading at 14-year highs? After all, global production last year was just 760 metric tons, according to the United States Geological Survey (USGS). Even at today’s elevated prices the world market’s nominal value is a modest $550 million.
Even as the U.S. and China slashed tariffs amid a 90-day trade truce, critical minerals were conspicuously missing from the deal — a silence that reflects their growing strategic weight. With China tightening its grip on rare earth exports, the U.S. is doubling down on efforts to secure domestic supplies of materials vital to clean energy, defense, and tech manufacturing.
As part of this push, the Trump administration announced on Monday that it will be fast-tracking environmental permitting for Anfield Energy’s proposed Velvet-Wood uranium mine project, slashing the review timeline to just 14 days.
KEDOUGOU, Senegal (AP) — The quickest way to separate gold from rock, Sadio Camara says, is with a drop of mercury. She empties a dime-sized packet of the silvery liquid into a plastic bucket of muddy sediment outside her home in southeastern Senegal. With bare hands and no mask, she swirls the mixture as her children look on.
“I know mercury isn’t good for your health — that’s why I don’t drink the water it comes into contact with,” she said. “I only process small amounts of gold, so there’s no danger.” But even small-scale exposure can carry serious risks. Across West Africa, mercury — a potent neurotoxin — remains the dominant method for extracting gold from ore in the region’s booming informal mining sector, much of it illegal and unregulated.
https://www.theglobeandmail.com/
The British Columbia government is moving forward with controversial legislation to allow it to fast-track major projects deemed to be of provincial significance, but Premier David Eby says none will be built without First Nations’ consent – and financial benefits.
The only way forward with major projects in the province is through Indigenous partnership, he said in an interview. Federally designated projects that would cross into B.C. should expect to meet the same standard, he added. “For us, it’s about actual ownership by the Nation whose territory the projects are going on.”
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Mineral processing, a home permitting boom and push to grow the city’s population emphasized in State of the City address
It was the city’s Latin motto, Aedificemus, that gave rise to the theme of Mayor Paul Lefebvre’s annual State of the City address, which he translated as “Come, let us build together.” Hosted by the Sudbury Chamber of Commerce, the May 1 speech was the mayor’s third address since he was elected in 2022.
A packed house heard the mayor speak to the economic progress and vision for the city, and saw the first ever showing of the artist rendition of the new downtown events centre facade.
