Commerce Resources, Chris Grove, from mail, 26.2.2015
In terms of the prices for tantalum, they have fallen a little bit on the spot market. The most important point about this though is that tantalum is valued at two very different prices – that which goes to the spot market and that for contract producers.
The first category, that being material that goes to the spot market, should be seen as material of “questionable origin”, which is really meant to indicate that there is an overriding question as to how this material was produced, which is expressed by keeping the origin of the material “opaque”. This is meant to indicate that tantalum material or “coltan’ from many areas in Central Africa may not be produced in compliance with the guidelines of the OECD, and as such, should be seen by the world as potentially “Conflict Material”.
This spot price material has typically, over the last 20 years, been valued at slightly less than half of what the value is for contract production that typically would come from an industrial producer like Tanco (Tantalum Mining Company of Canada), Kenticha (Ethiopia), Noventa (Mozambique), Advanced Material Group (Brazil), and the former and largest being Global Advanced Metals (Australia).
The typical prices for these two different supply streams was in 2008, $25.00 - $30.00 per pound on the spot market when the contract price was $60.00 per pound.
However, all of the above producers shut down in 2009/ 2010.
We then had the emergence of the US Dodd-Frank legislation (July 2010) and this had a very significant effect on price overall with the contract price going up to $140.00 - $150.00 per pound, and the spot price ran up to around $100.00 per pound!.
So, to say that the tantalum spot price is “down” may be correct, but I would say that overall it is still way, way up from where it was in 2008, and it continues to trade at a better price relative to the contract price, which is still in the $140.00 per pound range.
...If a strategic (like the current US company [NDA]) decided to do something with us (joint venture, offtake contract) then perhaps there would be a role for G to play.
This is exactly what we are working on.
Chris Grove |
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