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With micro volume today it makes me wonder where your trades are, can only assume it is delayed. I have let three sells through this morning at 2.15 on the retreating nickel values. The rest I will keep as they are all below 2p.

MWA appears to have stalled again on soft Nickel values. I do fear we could slide below 2p if that continues to be the case back to below $14000 a ton. MWA would still be profitable down to $13000 or so then it looks very sticky for the Glencore deal and it's viability. We need a couple of strong days for Nickel and/or gold; fortunately it looks like MWA have a good grip of costs right now and the smelter restart will certainly help in leaner times. It's all about the commodity values right now.

I did read a report recently that suggested the Chinese had a large volume of Indonesian ore that they had been blending but the stockpile was almost gone so they would need to buy much more in the near term. Who knows what is fact and what is bull. I do think the Nickel value has to go back up in the near term, that is no bull!

I do not think that data is available, the LME warehouses do cover the area but they are not broken down geographically. Reality is that China does not store NPI it is either held through agents in the form of warrants at LME warehouses or is supplied through agreements with miners. As we do not know what orders the stainless mills have and what is in train so knowing one side of the deal is not really helping anyone. We do know that China will grow by 7.3% this year which is the slowest for 20 years or so but compared to the rest of the world is significant growth. Fact is that supply from Asia will be restricted for the next 3 or 4 months due to the weather. Of course the end user will know all about that and will have planned around that fact but this year Indonesia is not there to supplement supply from the regions affected. We do need commodity prices up and costs down; the company are all over the cost savings.

Based on largely irrelevant industrial indicators. The real story is supply and demand not fractions of one percent growth forecasts. Nickel will come back to more sustainable values. Meanwhile BNC is still viable for Nickel given the reduced Glencore share. I guess until the smelter opens and costs reduce or Nickel recovers MWA will be toughing it out.

http://minesite.com/2014/10/23/mwana-africa-continues-to-generate-cash-as-production-rises-and-costs-fall-at-freda-rebecca-and-trojan/

Its on page 7 of 9 if anyone cannot see the detail in the quarterly update.

No Matt the answer was in the update but I did not see it first time round. They had two sales in New York, the second covered 70% of the care and maintenance (I suspect for the quarter), that was quite clear 70% just on the second sale. No indication of the size of the second sale but even if it were 10000 carats they are making a useful profit when compared against the $4m start-up for the mine. The slimes diamonds are just industrial quality, small and imperfect mainly used for cutting, grinding and polishing. Back underground at much higher concentration and gem quality the cash will come rolling in like the special stone 31,25 carats valued at US$ 8,200 per carat.

I got my answer. A further 17,700 carats is in stock, awaiting regulatory approval, before selling

15500 was the carats sold. I wonder if one of the partners takes diamonds rather than cash as they have sold less each quarter than they have produced. I took it as 70% of the quarter too.

I doubt very much if Nickel will drop back from any gains that we will experience once Indonesia sorts their supply out. Demand will rise as industry recovers globally, that is the theory the pundits are largely supporting. The important factor for MWA is that they can reliability produce close to 10000 a ton with their own smelter.

Last quarter they sold less than half of the diamonds but a similar amount to the total last year. At the AGM Mpinga said the slimes production was profitable. The cost of opening underground operations is just $4m and the restart will be rapid. The resource is a good one; if only they can stop it flooding the project is a good one.

I believe MWA own 76% of BNC. The wording on the RNS is vague. There were two sales in the quarter but only 15500 carats was sold. The latest diamond sale covers 70% of the care and maintenance. Is that 70% of the year, the quarter? All very vague really. The exact words were: "The second sale alone covered 70% of the mine's care and maintenance costs". With the clean-up complete I suspect the care and maintenance costs are minimal so I believe the Diamonds are making a healthy profit.

Next year is into my mid term, I see the short term as six weeks or so. I suspect Nickel will test $7 several times before breaking up. Could happen this year but I suspect January when the supply tightens to snapping point. I suspect it will take actual tightening rather than paper tightening.

wuffle often they are although that is including upgrading feed and mining to match however mining capacity is currently large enough to take a third mill so the upgrades there could be minimal to build some redundant capacity.

The decision is made, the equipment has been bought and is in train the work on-site is progressing all from MWA's internal funds. However currently apparently they do not have (or want to spend) the remaining $13m from internal funds hence the debt funding. Personally I would rather take it a bit slower and not use debt funding; the benefit must be diluted with the funding costs but at the moment Mpinga is still minded to take the debt. Problem is after talking publically about debt funding it is difficult not to go for it as it makes it appear funding was refused. It is just very difficult and expensive to secure funding for BIND.ZW in Zimbabwe.

The near term goal for the gold is to be below $1000 an oz. That can only happen on technically smooth quarters at maximum rate. The plant is the bottleneck and the addition of a 3rd mill is the way forwards and will increase production to 100k ozs pa. It will also allow for planned rotational shutdowns and a 3rd shift; these will massively reduce the technical risk. Investment about $50-70m. I doubt they will do that until after the indigenisation is resolved and Mpinga is keeping this up his sleeve for negotiations when the time comes. Obviously the Minister is not going to want a Zim black to have to immediately put their hands in their pockets. Freda Rebecca is a huge local employer in a time of rampant unemployment. When looking for upside we need to watch commodity values closely; gold is our rising star right now, Nickel is still strong but in the very short term uncertain.

Nickel still has very positive margins $2000 a ton but will not become a real heavy earner until after the smelter is running and processing Trojan and third party ore or the value of Nickel recovers strongly. gold looks like the important earner right now as costs are forced down and production is ramped up. MWA will make another strong profit this current quarter. H1 results should be out December and it appears that we will get debt funding confirmation before year end. We will also get results from the Copper drilling campaign and something from the feasibility study at ZK over the net few months. MWA is performing strongly and well in profit; how much however depends on the commodity prices.

As expected a very strong operational performance on all fronts. Nickel costs well under control with $2000+ margin at the current price so we can expect strong profitability to continue. Real scale being achieved at Freda Rebecca now making the whole thing worthwhile and providing real upside if the POG rallies as I feel it must. It is great to hear that there are 8 rigs on the ground drilling for Copper and visible mineralisation; we can expect a big update in due course. All in all very pleasing and just underlining the value and quality at Mwana.

Next weeks results are very much already out there. 2of 3 months already announced one third of the way through the last month. News from the smelter restart will be telling as they should be well into the timeline by now. Every ounce will count in the gold battle against costs. The nickel costs will be up on last quarter with the glencore 35% having a large effect with increased values. The commodity prices are the strongest challenge and one of only a few elements out of the companies control.