TOP NEWS
US senators move to block Trump tariffs
Republican and Democratic U.S. senators plan to block President Donald Trump's move to impose tariffs on national security grounds by introducing legislation that would require him to secure approval from the Congress first, Reuters wrote, citing a senior senator. Republican Senator Bob Corker, who also chairs the Foreign Relations Committee, said the legislation could be unveiled June 6.
Aluminum producer China Hongqiao secures US$4.7B to upgrade manufacturing
Aluminum producer China Hongqiao Group Ltd. secured funding of 30 billion Chinese yuan, or about US$4.7 billion, to upgrade its manufacturing facilities, Reuters reported. The financing agreement with Industrial Bank Co. Ltd. will allow the company to construct facilities for producing lightweight automobile parts and other downstream products.
Report: BHP's US shale unit receives bids for up to US$9B
First-round bids for BHP Billiton Group's U.S. shale business from oil majors including BP PLC and Chevron Corp. valued the unit at between US$7 billion and US$9 billion, Bloomberg News reported, citing people familiar with the matter. The mining major prefers to sell the unit to a single party and expects to invite second-round bids as early as July. However, it could net as much as US$13 billion if it sells the assets piecemeal, the sources said.
DIVERSIFIED
* Glencore PLC and South Africa's Public Investment Corp. could emerge as the buyers of Chevron's South African assets, which are estimated to be worth US$900 million, by exercising a pre-emptive right held by Chevron's empowerment partner, Business Day wrote.
* Rio Tinto awarded a contract for waste management services covering 16 mine sites and two ports in Western Australia's Pilbara region to Pilbara Aboriginal business North West Alliance.
BASE METALS
* MinRex Resources Ltd. estimated a JORC 2012-compliant maiden inferred mineral resource at its Pacific Express project in New South Wales, Australia, of 697,000 tonnes at 1,157 parts per million cobalt, 9,043 ppm nickel and 39.5 ppm scandium.
* CAP SA is considering expanding its operations in Peru and entering the copper mining business, said the company's finance manager, Raúl Gamonal, as quoted by Bloomberg News. Gamonal said the Chilean steelmaker also "watches with interest" the sale of a stake in Mantos Copper SA, a joint venture that operates the Mantos Blancos copper mine in Chile. If CAP acquires this share, it would be its first investment in copper, daily Diario Financiero reported.
* Clive Palmer said his company QNI Resources Pty. Ltd. should be allowed to reopen the nickel refinery in north Queensland, Australia, and has approved plans for the restart, The Australian reported. The refinery ceased operations after a separate Palmer-owned company went into voluntary administration.
* PT Indonesia Asahan Aluminium (Persero) President Director Budi Gunadi Sadikin said talks with Rio Tinto for the divestment of shares of Freeport-McMoRan Inc. unit PT Freeport Indonesia may not be completed in June, The Jakarta Post reported.
* Trilogy Metals Inc. called a new cobalt resource of 77 million pounds of contained cobalt at the Bornite copper project in Alaska "one of the largest cobalt resources in North America," but its projected economic value is still up in the air and will depend in part on how much of the metal is recoverable, which is uncertain at this point, S&P Global Market Intelligence reported.
* Greenfields Exploration Ltd. will have its looming crowd-sourced competition results to find targets for its Frontier project in Greenland assessed by a Center for Exploration Targeting doctorate student, which will be a new step for the mining industry, according to an independent geological expert who has placed third in similar competitions run by Integra Gold Corp. and Endomines AB.
* Indian state-owned miner Hindustan Copper Ltd. is aiming to ramp up its smelting capacity to 100,000 tonnes per annum from the existing 70,000 tonnes and reach a turnover of 20 billion Indian rupees by the end of this fiscal year, Mint reported, citing Santosh Sharma, the company's chairman and managing director.
* A feasibility study on the first phase of Trigon Metals Inc.'s restart program for its past-producing Kombat copper project in Namibia defined an after-tax net present value of US$4.6 million, discounted at 7.6%, with a 103.4% internal rate of return.
PRECIOUS METALS
* Zimplats Holdings Ltd. agreed to release 23,903 hectares of land to the government of Zimbabwe to settle an ongoing dispute, which arose in 2013 after the government announced its intention to seize 27,948 hectares within the miner's special mining lease area.
* Ramelius Resources Ltd. said ore reserve for the Greenfinch deposit, part of the Edna May gold mine in Western Australia, increased by 88% to 62,000 ounces of gold contained in 1.7 million tonnes grading 1.2 g/t gold.
* Seven people are missing after a tailings dam collapse at the Cieneguita gold-silver complex in Chihuahua, Mexico, the Associated Press reported, citing Mexican authorities. Workers were swept away in the incident, according to local media reports. Two others are hospitalized.
* Orinoco Gold Ltd. expects to lift force majeure and resume normal activities at its Cascavel gold mine in Brazil on June 9, following the conclusion of the truck drivers' strike in the country as well as the completion of plant maintenance and repairs at the site.
* Harmony Gold Mining Co. Ltd. plans to sell new shares to qualifying investors to raise up to 1.26 billion South African rand, or about US$100 million, through an accelerated bookbuild. The company will use the proceeds to partially repay a US$150 million bridge loan raised for the Moab Khotsong gold mine acquisition. Harmony closed the offering and raised about US$82 million, or 1.05 billion rand, through the placement of 55,055,050 new common shares at 19.12 rand apiece.
* Wishbone Gold PLC said that while its processing plant in Honduras is fully operational and undertaking batch processing, full production is delayed pending certain permits to process large amounts of gold ore. Full production was originally expected in May.
* A pre-feasibility study on IAMGOLD Corp.'s proposed heap leach operation at its open pit Essakane gold mine in Burkina Faso estimated initial CapEx at US$155 million. A feasibility study is now underway and scheduled to complete in the first quarter of 2019.
* International Samuel Exploration Corp. will complete the acquisition of the Lucifer gold project in British Columbia via the issuance of 1 million shares to the sellers.
* Petropavlovsk PLC is investigating the mystery shareholders behind a proposal to replace all members of the current board at the next annual general meeting.
* Endomines AB decided to postpone investment to continue production at the Pampalo gold mine in Finland beyond September. As a result, output will be temporarily suspended.
BULK COMMODITIES
* Voestalpine AG proposed a dividend of €1.40 per share after booking a 43% increase in full-year operating profit. According to Reuters, the Austrian steelmaker's revenues in the period stood at €12.9 billion. In a separate report, Reuters said Wolfgang Eder will resign as Voestalpine's CEO in 2019 after 15 years in the post.
* Ezz Steel Co.'s net loss in the first quarter shrunk year over year to 67 million Egyptian pounds, compared to 521 million pounds in the year-ago quarter. Long steel production increased 10% year over year to 857,000 tonnes in the quarter.
* Ryerson Holding Corp. agreed to acquire U.S. metal service center Central Steel & Wire Co. in a deal that values the latter at US$140 million. Central Steel & Wire's portfolio focuses on bar, tube, plate and sheet products.
* Anglo American PLC's head of its coal division, Tyler Mitchelson, said Aurizon Holdings Ltd.'s actions related to its dispute with the Queensland Competition Authority are damaging the coal sector, The Australian reported. The rail network operator threatened to cut capacity after the regulator proposed a A$3.89 billion cap on the revenue the rail operator can charge over four years to June 2021.
* The European Commission is under pressure from domestic steel producers to quickly impose an import quota on the metal from the rest of the world in a potential response to U.S. tariffs, which would heighten fears of a global trade war.
* The London Metal Exchange said it was working with "all the parties involved" to see if it could expand access to United Co. Rusal PLC's aluminum, but the exchange needs to be cautious, Reuters reported, citing CEO Matthew Chamberlain.
* U.S. Steel Corp. will restart the second of two blast furnaces at its Granite City Works property in Illinois by Oct. 1. The restart will support increased demand for locally made steel while allowing the company to continue supporting customers during planned asset revitalization efforts.
* Analysts believe that Fortescue Metals Group Ltd. will have to export iron ore from Port Hedland in Western Australia at a record rate this month to meet its annual guidance of 170 million tonnes, The West Australian wrote. The company shipped 38.7 million tonnes in the March quarter, its poorest export quarter since June 2014.
* The Queensland, Australia, government is still considering funding an estimated A$100 million upfront cost of road access for Adani Enterprises Ltd.'s Carmichael coal project in the state, despite announcing that it would not commit any taxpayer funds for the project, ABC reported.
* An explosion at the Huamei Group Co.-owned iron ore project in China's Liaoning province left 11 dead and injured nine others, Reuters reported, citing state media. Another 25 people remain trapped following the blast.
* Altitude Resources Inc. initiated a strategic review of its assets and plans to spin out its Altitude Resources Ltd. unit to existing shareholders.
SPECIALTY
* S&P Global Ratings assigned a B- long-term corporate credit rating to vanadium miner Largo Resources Ltd., with a stable outlook. The rating reflects the company's limited operating breadth as a single-asset producer of vanadium as all of its output is generated from the Maracas Menchen mine in Brazil.
* Western Australia's government said the state's eastern goldfields will be put at the forefront of the lithium processing industry with Neometals Ltd.'s signing of an option agreement with the city of Kalgoorlie-Boulder for a proposed 10,000 tonne-per-year lithium hydroxide plant.
* Botswana Diamonds PLC was awarded the 2.5-hectare Mooikloof kimberlite pipe concession in South Africa. Meanwhile, the technical economic evaluation report for the Thorny River project estimated a deposit of 1.2 million to 2 million tonnes, a grade of 46 to 74 carats per hundred tonnes, and values of US$120 to US$220 per carat.
* Energy Resources of Australia Ltd. plans to stop mining and processing at its Ranger uranium project in Northern Territory, Australia, by January 2021, and final rehabilitation will be completed by January 2026.
INDUSTRY NEWS
* Data from the Democratic Republic of the Congo's finance ministry showed that the country's revenues from the mining sector tripled year on year to US$397.9 million in the first quarter, Reuters reported.
* Rwanda is looking to quadruple its revenues from mineral exports by 2024, from the current US$373 million to US$1.5 billion as the country's Mines, Petroleum and Gas Board expects 13 new mining blocks to start operating between July 2018 and June 2019, Bloomberg News wrote.
* The Mexican peso tumbled as the country unveiled a detailed list of tariffs on U.S. food and steel products in retaliation for U.S. levies on aluminum and steel.
This S&P Global Market Intelligence news article may contain information about credit ratings issued by S&P Global Ratings, a separately managed division of S&P Global. Descriptions in this news article were not prepared by S&P Global Ratings. The original S&P Global Ratings documents referred to in this news brief can be found in the sources section.
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