FROM "Tuesday, December 07, 2010 by Ian Lyall"
The market deficit outside China is likely to be around 14,500 tonnes of tungsten metal per year by 2013, according to the Commodities Research Unit. The market deficit outside China is likely to be around 14,500 tonnes of tungsten metal per year by 2013, according to the Commodities Research Unit.
What is bound to help is the story unfolding around tungsten itself, a strategic metal used in construction and manufacturing, and whose supply is in the hands of the Chinese.
The People’s Republic is responsible for 77 per cent of the world’s supply of primary tungsten, but is cutting exports in order to satisfy booming domestic demand.
This has delivered a double blow to the West as the price of tungsten trioxide has shot up from US$200 per metric tonne unit (the standard 10 kilogramme measure) to the current price of around US$320 per MTU, while a gap in supply has opened up.
The market deficit outside China is likely to be around 14,500 tonnes of tungsten metal per year by 2013, according to the Commodities Research Unit.
All of which makes for the perfect storm if you happen to be opening a tungsten mine |