The move to save Mactung raises red flags about the dire state of global resource markets, and the lengths the NWT government is willing to go to try to salvage the mining industry.
Tungsten price climb will be slow: analysts Critics in the Dehcho had long grumbled about NATCL’s properties, which despite geographically resting — at least somewhat, in the case of Mactung — in the Northwest Territories, really only contributed economically to the Yukon in terms of jobs, while leaving the NWT with all the risk. For Cantung, that risk now lies with Canada. While NATCL has indicated it hopes to resume operations at the mine (which closed on Oct. 27 following 80 layoffs in the Rock Drilling Tool spring) by next summer, that’s going to depend on financing. Tungsten prices are currently bottoming out at around $180 per MT, down significantly from their 2010 climb to around $450. Although current forecasts peg the price of tungsten as poised to rise over the next few years, the recovery from this 10-year low is likely to be slow. “I think we will see the price begin to rise slowly as economic demand recovers, but it is going to be nothing dramatic,” analyst Chris Ecclestone of Hallgarten & Company said in a recent interview with Tungsten Investing News. “If financing improves for the mining sector, it’s not going to be a case of everyone in the mining sector suddenly being able to get money. It will probably be gold projects and big base metals projects getting funding before dth drill bits specialty metals.” An optimistic view places the price of tungsten closer to $200 by the end of the year and possibly $300 by the end of 2016, but the light at the end of the tunnel is conditional upon a lot of what-ifs, most notably what China — tungsten’s biggest exporter — decides to do about regulating its production. So what if the price never rebounds?http://bensonwalk.blogtez.com/post5.php

Posted by: philipjere at 02:24 AM | No Comments | Add Comment
Post contains 332 words, total size 2 kb.