Bauxite minnow looks for big opening
May 16 - 22, 2012
MAY 14: “WE’RE not quite what we seem,” says Bauxite Resources managing director Scott Donaldson, and under the circumstances, with the company’s share price languishing, it sounds like a mea culpa. But Donaldson means to accentuate the positive. And on this score he seems to have a strong supporting case.
Moore about getting on with the job
May 2 - 8, 2012
THE quietly impressive managing director of nickel miner and diversified explorer Mincor Resources, David Moore, has, it’s got to be said, little time for analyst types and their short sighted nickel views within dynamic, ever-changing world markets.
Operating mines support Panoramic growth scope
April 25 - May 1, 2012
IMPRESSIVE operator Panoramic Resources has delivered another strong quarter at it nickel mines and while UBS has become more bearish on the nickel price, it remains of the view the miner is both fundamentally undervalued and leveraged to a potential earning uplift in a falling Australian dollar environment.
A challenge to the end
April 4 - 10, 2012
AS THE old saying goes, necessity is the mother of all invention, and faced with closure in the wake of the Anzac Day 2006 tragedy, the Tasmania gold mine in Beaconsfield had to come up with new mining methods to remain in business.
Technology key to deep mining future
March 28 - April 3, 2012
IF THE gold industry in South Africa is to remain a significant force into the future, mechanisation and automation will have to replace the labour intensive operations of today. In AngloGold Ashanti’s sights, 2020 features as a key year.
Best of both worlds
February 29 - March 6, 2012
HILLGROVE Resources has paid a hefty price for boldly replacing an historic copper mine with a modern one less than an hour’s drive from a major Australian city. But if it can maintain the stewardship standards set so far it may reap significant longer-term dividends from its location. Investors, as ever, will be hoping the rewards come sooner rather than later.
Lougher may open up M&A vista
February 1 - 7, 2012
UNSURPRISINGLY new managing director Dan Lougher wasn’t going to come into the top job at Western Areas talking big, brash and bold. But away from the headlines there’s certainly indications of balls being in the air. Indeed a deal or two in 2012 looks odds-on as management of the world’s best margin nickel mines wrestles with how to start moving its company up the market value chain.
Independence gloom unwarranted
December 15 - 21, 2011
WHILE the acquisition of Jabiru obviously hasn’t gone exactly to plan for Independence, the criticism of Independence seems a little wide of the mark. Since when did takeovers in the resources sector not come with risk?
No end in sight for Aquila iron ore journey
December 8 - 14, 2011
HOW long is a piece of string? That’s the oft-used cliché that springs most readily to mind when wondering how long it might be before participants in a major iron ore joint venture in Western Australia resolve their differences and get on with developing a significant new operation.
BC on the move
December 1 - 7, 2011
BC IRON has moved smoothly into production mode at its iron ore mining venture in Western Australia, according to an analyst site visit this week.
The writing on the wall
November 17 - 23, 2011
NOVEMBER 15: WHILE history, and indeed many current indicators, show mining projects get pushed through all kinds of investment risk safety barriers, there is a theory at least that says that ‘in the real world’, where available capital is restricted, selection of a project for investment should be based on an appropriate grading method. Cue Peter McCarthy, who maintains the choice more often than not boils down to quantity rather than quality.
Strategy risks include mine KPIs
November 17 - 23, 2011
NOVEMBER 15: AUSTRALIAN Centre for Geomechanics director Yves Potvin picked up where AMC Consultants chairman Peter McCarthy left off at a Perth mining conference focused on ‘strategic versus tactical’ mining last week. Leading mine KPIs, Potvin said, could feed the short-term focus and site behaviours that clashed with strategies set out in feasibility studies.
Senior managers talk tactics, strategies
November 10 - 16, 2011
MORE than 80 delegates turned out at this week’s Fourth International Seminar on Strategic versus Tactical Approaches in Mining, staged by the Australian Centre for Geomechanics, in Perth, Western Australia.
Plotting tactics fall short of geotech strategy
November 10 - 16, 2011
MICHAEL Dunn didn’t waste any time answering the question in his presentation title: Geotechnical data – a strategic or tactical issue? “I consider geotechnical management to be a strategic issue,” he told delegates at the Fourth International Seminar on Strategic versus Tactical Approaches in Mining. Suffice to say, the really important questions came later.
Reassuring Independence
October 27 - November 2, 2011
CONCERNS about Independence’s Jabiru project have apparently been allayed after the company took a bunch of analysts to the base metal operation last week to show them everything was back on track and going well.
Pieces of silver
October 27 - November 2, 2011
SILVER miner Alcyone Resources is moving forward with plans to establish a second mine close to its revamped Twin Hills processing plant as it commences drilling and blasting of ore in the main pit and sets about demonstrating the full design capacity of the restarted operation this quarter.
Iron appeal for earthmoving party
October 6 - 12, 2011
WITH BHP Billiton giving it the heave-ho in the Pilbara recently, would a large magnetite project on South Australia’s central Eyre Peninsular offer Leighton a nice business opportunity in the iron ore sector? Or another mining contractor?
Kings in sand castles
September 29 - October 5, 2011
THE miner’s response to the fantastic new world of mineral sands pricing that has emerged this year is building (so to speak!), with the corporate players, financiers and project developers comprising the bulk of the response thus far.
Single voice
September 29 - October 5, 2011
HEARING a mining executive having something positive to publicly say about the hot job market and, shock, horror, the Federal Government authorities as well, is, on account of its rareness, a rather extraordinary event indeed.
Nickel’s true believers make their case
September 29 - October 5, 2011
TRUE believers in nickel they unarguably are, but the sense of optimism in the medium and longer term from a gathering of nickel players in Australia last week stands in obvious contrast to the general short term gloom and doom bedevilling, so to speak, the devil’s metal.
