December 31, 2017
Over the last week copper prices have stormed back over $3USD/lb, and normally light holiday trade has been met with some heavy news flow out of China. China is by far the largest market for copper, and a string of data has supported a very positive narrative for copper prices going forward. The...
December 8, 2017
The way that people work is changing fast. Automation is becoming widespread at a time when a number of other technologies are entering maturity, and the results of this on the future of industry could be profound. Driverless cars might be the thin end of the wedge when it comes advanced...
December 7, 2017
This year the Mines & Money conference in London was a target for protests by a wide range of concerned persons. Some of the most common criticisms that are leveled against big miners is that their operations destroy water systems, and displace native communities. They are also accused of not...
December 7, 2017
Many people associate the phrase “Made in China” with less than stellar quality. To be sure, there is a lot of lower quality products that are still manufactured all over China. But the government in China has made developing higher quality industries a big priority. With this push to...
December 5, 2017
There was continued talk of a new market for physical gold sales at this year's Russian Bullion Market Conference in Moscow. First Deputy Chairman of the Bank of Russia, Sergey Shvetsov, delivered a speech that reaffirmed Russia's commitment to create a new settlement system for gold sales...
December 3, 2017
2017 saw a dramatic reversal of base metal's fortunes. Since the middle of the year, most of the industrial metals have seen large price gains, as the possibility of shortages, and great economic data presented an overlooked bull case for the entire complex. The past year also saw a number of...
December 2, 2017
The gold price took a shot last week, and closed the week below $1280 USD/oz. This marks a weekly close below the 200 Day MA, which currently sits $1286 USD/oz, and according to chartists, this could mark the beginnings of further declines for the yellow metal. The move downward began after the...
November 22, 2017
By now pretty everyone knows two things about Electric Vehicles (EV's), and the elements that make them possible. Firstly, there isn't supply of them at the moment, and secondly, many of them come from places that aren't stable. Cobalt and The Democratic Republic of the Congo illustrate...
November 21, 2017
If you are interested in buying precious metals, there are good reasons to follow up on your hunch. Gold is the metal that usually comes to mind when investing in precious metals is brought up, but silver has some unique advantages that no other metal shares, especially at its current...
November 10, 2017
Zinc and Lead are extremely useful metals. The world may be learning just how dear they are today, as zinc prices push though highs seen more than a decade ago. A recent move by commodities powerhouse Glencore to curb zinc production is partly responsible for zinc's big run, but a non stop need...
October 30, 2017
The world is moving towards a very new energy mix. Over the last few years the cost of producing electricity from wind power has dropped substantially. Over the weekend Germany's wind farms produced so much electricity that rates actually went negative. That means that when someone turned on...
October 25, 2017
According to reports from the Nikkei Asian Review, the Shanghai International Energy Exchange (SIEE) is in the last stages of preparation before launching a crude oil futures contract that will be both open to international entities, and priced in Chinese Yuan. China recently overtook the United...
October 24, 2017
In the Western world, gold just isn't very interesting. Central banks were sellers of the yellow metal for a long time, but now, the gold reserves for countries like the United States, England, France and Germany are basically stable. There have been some squabbles recently about where...
October 23, 2017
The 19th Party Congress is well underway in Beijing, and with his opening speech Xi Jinping touched briefly on what could become one of the largest economic and geopolitical drivers of the 21st century. The Belt and Road initiative (BRI) is massive in its scope, and may be the thing that shifts the...