Copper news8 Dec 2023 17:07
I saw that AAL had a big drop today due to announcing they are scaling back production to cut costs.
They are putting their Los Bronces copper mine in Chile on care and maintenance.
"Anglo lowered its 2024 output target for copper to between 730,000 tons and 790,000 tons, from as much as 1 million tons, essentially removing the equivalent of a large copper mine from global supply. Production will fall even further in 2025, before starting to rise again the following year.
The company’s biggest problem is its Los Bronces mine in Chile. Like many of the industry’s biggest copper mines, the operation is more than 100 years old and Anglo is now struggling with hard ore that contains low grades of metal. Rather than mine this expensive-to-process ore, the company has decided to wait until it can blend it with higher grade material. Unfortunately for Anglo, that will take several years."
On top of this,
"Panama will shut one of the world’s largest copper mines, its president said on Tuesday, after the country’s Supreme Court struck down a Canadian company’s [First Quantum Minerals] contract to operate it amid large protests.
The court’s unanimous vote against the contract for the Cobre Panamá mine — which accounts for more than 1 per cent of global copper output — came after analysts and investors had begun to reassess Panama’s business-friendly image."
Considering the amount of copper over the next few years is predicted to increase, between these two that's taken a chunk out of production. Lack of supply and increase in demand should feed in to increase the copper price.
Perhaps a new modern mine that produces copper in a safe jurisdiction could come on line, plug a tiny bit of the gap, and take advantage of the new demand??
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