Ich hab es mal aus dem TCM Thread kopiert. Klaus dürfte nichts dagegen haben. ;-) Es kommt auch unsere CYU drin vor.
@biwel oder auch andere, die evtl. des englischen nicht so mächtig sind, wenn Du den Text so nicht lesen kannst, jag ihn mal für Dich selber durch z.B. Google Translater. Um Verfälschungen zu vermeiden, möchte ich ihn hier lieber im Original einstellen. Der Text kommt ursprünglich aus dem Stockhouse Forum. Author: Lawrence Williams Posted: Thursday , 25 Oct 2007
LONDON -
Mining Journal's 20:20 half day focused presentational meetings held in London picked an interesting subject for today's event, namely molybdenum. Most moly production is from byproduct porphyry copper operations, but the speakers here represented current and prospective focused mining companies which would enable an investor to take a position on the metal itself and on some of its producers.
Molybdenum is primarily used in the steel sector in the manufacture of austenitic corrosion resistant grades of stainless steel, low alloy steels and in the manufacture of steel tools and castings. Lesser amounts are used in other industries like chemicals and oil.
There are a number of factors that have come into play which has led to molybdenum substantially outperforming markets for most other metals over the past few years - notably the big increase in steel production - and in particular that for stainless steel - coupled with declining production from some of the traditional producers, a huge reduction in exports of Chinese molybdenum and a lack of new projects coming on stream. Looking at the market in general, Tony Warwick-Ching of metals analysis specialists CRU was extremely positive on the future of molybdenum prices in the short and medium term (positive for a miner that is, not necessarily so for a consumer!).
The title of Warwick-Ching's presentation was "Does moly need new producers?" The answer was a pretty resounding ‘Yes'. He feels the market is in the middle of a major price rally which is sustainable over the next several years - and possibly beyond - and although the current rally is "the most spectacular in history", the price has still not yet reached its real-terms peak achieved briefly in the late ‘70s.
He quoted three reasons for optimism - Robust Demand, Lean Supply and a High Incentive Price for new production.
He also noted that, unlike some other metals where substitution has become a factor when big price increases have occurred, the moly market has proved so far to be remarkably non-sensitive to price increases. With stainless steel consumption growing 6 percent a year, demand is likely to remain robust.
On the supply side 70 percent of output is as a byproduct of copper mining and here the primary mines are close to full capacity. Some have been high grading moly production - sometimes at the expense of copper grades - to take advantage of the recent high prices, but indications are that the high-grade production is now falling back again.
Warwick-Ching reckons the existing major copper/moly producers are running out of steam, reactivated mines are peaking and, as noted above, high grading is on the downturn, but demand continues to increase thus creating a strong position for new producers - but most of those in the pipeline unlikely to start coming into production until late 2008/early 2009 at the earliest.
It is possible that technology advances may improve recoveries at existing operations which may help the supply position, but only marginally. Growth in demand is put at a very conservative 4.5% per annum.
The rest of the meeting was filled with presentations from mining companies reckoning on helping plug the supply/demand gap - a task possibly made easier by the strong price projections. Several of the presenters did comment on the overall market, but none, hardly surprisingly, disagreed in substance with Warwick-Ching's analysis. All those presenting had very interesting new development projects under way which made for an excellent couple of sessions. Those companies represented were Adanac Molybdenum, Columbia Yukon Exploration (both with big low grade projects in British Columbia, Canada), Queensland Ores and Moly Mines with high potential Australian projects - one small and one large, Virgin Metals with a very exciting small moly/copper project which could lead into thye development of a much larger copper/moly one - and Thompson Creek Metals, already the world's fourth largest moly producer from its Thompson Creek and Endako mines and with another big high grade potential underground property close enough to its Endako mine to reduce capital costs by trucking ore to the Endako mill. For a mining sector with a relatively small universe of producers and potential producers the 20:20 event provided insights into an interesting cross section of those involved in the primary production field.
http://www.mineweb.com/mineweb/view/mineweb/en/...oid=38872&sn=Detail
LG, Harley
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