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GOLD’s gradual decline from the beginning of the year followed by spectacular losses in mid-April have prompted gold bulls into a fighting withdrawal and seen the bears firing from the hip. Most shots have been taken from the safety of the trenches but London’s Association of Mining Analysts last month established a frontline for the battle, pitting three of gold’s most bullish bulls against three ardent grizzly bears in a debate at Burlington House, London.
SELF funding Phoenix Gold (ASX: PXG) is set to kick off mining of its second modest gold deposit in the Western Australian goldfields with a venture that is expected to generate net cash flow in excess of $A3 million based on a gold price of $A1350 per ounce.
A MINE water solidifying agent developed for specific underground applications is said to have performed well in trials and could become a valuable weapon in the battle some mines wage against unwelcome water ingress.
FORMER Newcrest Mining geotechnical engineer Michael Pfitzner has joined pitt&sherry as principal consultant – mining geomechanics in the consulting firm’s mining division.
JUNE 13: Endeavour Mining remains on track for first production in early 2014 with the delivery of the ball and SAG mills at its fourth African mine, Agbaou in Cote d’Ivoire.
JUNE 13: Canadian miner Alacer Gold has placed its Australian assets on the market after receiving non-binding expressions of interests from several potential buyers.
JUNE 13: Cash-strapped African Eagle Resources is facing a winding-up petition from former chairman Euan Worthington over a claimed debt of £57,005.09.
JUNE 13: Mining giant Rio Tinto has agreed to sell its Eagle nickel-copper project under construction in Michigan, USA to Canada’s Lundin Mining Corp for $US325M cash.
JUNE 13: Irish miner Galantas Gold is set to begin a revised economic study into the development of an underground mine at its Omagh gold mine in County Tyrone, Northern Ireland, after releasing an updated resource estimate.
JUNE 12: Forbes & Manhattan Coal has ridden monthly production records at both its Magdalena bituminous and Aviemore mines in April and May to lift output by 16% year-on-year to 447,000t for the May quarter (Q1 2014).
SELFISHNESS is a reasonably universal human failing, if indeed you want to call it a failing. As dear old Gordon Gekko said, “greed is good … greed works”. Self-obsession to a large degree is genetically hardwired – looking after number one is the way that most animals, other than ants, managed to get on in the world and so who are we to argue with evolution?
POOR financial returns from the world’s leading miners are highlighting an inefficient use of capital that, allowed to continue, will threaten their ongoing position in equity portfolios. Australia’s national accounts, released this month, have also pointed to the prospect of diminishing returns from capital employed in the industry.
THE recent Seventh International Symposium on Ground Support in Mining and Underground Construction drew about 200 leading geomechanics experts from around the world, and many anxious to learn from them, to Western Australia. Judging by feedback to an exclusive HighGrade survey of attendees, the eighth symposium, in Sweden in 2015, can’t come soon enough.
JAMES O McKinsey (of management consulting fame) once stated that “everything can be measured and what gets measured gets managed”. In one short sentence McKinsey sums up just about everything which is wrong with the way business (and notably the mining business) is understood and conducted.
WELCOME to the new world (or should that be old one?) of rising resource nationalism, says Ernst & Young’s global mining and metals leader Mike Elliott.
DESPITE the good timing with regards his exit given the subsequent declining gold price, former Newcrest Mining managing director Ian Smith might be disappointed his much lauded stewardship of the gold miner has been taking a hit with the current travails.
MORGAN Stanley investment bank, in a recent report, added its voice to the chorus expecting Australia’s big miners to carve out significant cost savings from contractors and suppliers. The bank suggested (and it wasn’t alone) “suppliers who provide contract mining [services] will be targeted for the most significant cost savings”. HighGrade Briefing caught up with the managing director of Australia’s largest privately owned underground mining contractor, Steve Coughlan, for his views.
THE standard claims and counter-claims are being thrown around in the Mineral Deposits versus Teranga Gold stoush, and while there seem elements of truth and nonsense in various measures from both sides, the lesson perhaps lies with the old adage of being careful who you get into bed with.
SHAREHOLDERS will be hoping a presentation by Blackthorn Resources’ outgoing CEO at a UBS conference in Sydney this week may have finally stopped the horrendous market run of the recent investor darling.
MICRO minnow AusNiCo is pushing ahead with a big tin project in New South Wales that, despite public perceptions, it believes will become a large-scale, profitable tin operation.
IN nearly 25 years of working, and more recently living in Africa, Peter Anderton has seen the commercial landscape shift radically for companies from his native Australia. Now, he says, the diverse patchwork of nations making up the continent is changing faster than ever – with plenty of upside for those prepared to negotiate the risk hurdles.
WHILE governments of all persuasions have not covered themselves in glory picking economic winners for a very long time, Alan Broome believes Australia could be on a sure thing with the mining equipment, technology and services (METS) sector.
INTERNATIONAL Mining is reminding underground mining groups that there are now only two months to go until its inaugural Rapid Development Conference in Sydney, which will be held from August 14 to 16 at the Sydney Harbour Marriott, just before AIMEX the following week.
ALAN Cooper has been called a lot of things but he probably hasn’t heard ‘incubator’ too often.
CAE Mining has clinched a deal with emerging gold producer Besra Gold to supply it with a package of its software products over the next two months.
GEOVIA has kept up a current industry theme of haulage cost and dump scheduling efficiency with the formal release of Minex 6.2, its comprehensive coal GMP package.
CATERPILLAR is using this week’s Longwall USA conference and expo to put development of the new EL 1000 shearer on mine owners’ radars.
LOWER coal prices may be forcing New South Wales producers to cut, cut, cut, but it seems some still have eyes – and ears – on the future. Take Moolarben Coal, for example.
IT WAS Eleanor Roosevelt who once said, ‘great minds discuss ideas, average minds discuss events and small minds discuss people’, providing a useful mantra to sum up the values, if not the social intelligence, of others. Speaking to some of Australia’s best minds in mining R&D about their ideas to tackle the biggest issues facing the industry has helped shape HighGrade’s list of mining’s top 10 research priorities.
