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Molybdenum prices expected to rise 10% this year
By Tom Stundza -- Purchasing, 9/11/2008
Producers expect molybdenum prices to stay above $30/lb in 2008 because demand for the metal, which is used to strengthen steel, has strengthened in the face of six-month world crude steel production that has increased 5.7% (to 696.1 million metric tons) over the first six months of the year.
"The outlook for molybdenum demand continues to be good," Kevin Loughrey, CEO of producer Thompson Creek Metals in Denver tells Wall Street analysts in a conference call to discuss the company's second-quarter financial results. "The molybdenum market remains strong (and) prices have been very stable."
Loughrey says "the occasional customer is taking a bit less" this year, citing in particular "foundries that sell (castings) to the automotive industry." But, he adds, "most of our customers are taking toward the top end of what they're entitled to take."
He says his company's average realized price on molybdenum sales was $32.69/lb in the first half of 2008, up 21.4% from $26.93/lb in the first half of 2007. Loughrey says that "sales prices have remained in excess of $30/lb during 2008 and are expected to remain at approximately these levels for the remainder of the year."
Molybdenum production at the Thompson Creek Mine during the second quarter of 2008 was 4 million lbs, up 11.1% from 3.6 million lbs in the first quarter of 2008 and up 73.9% from 2.3 million lbs in the second quarter of 2007. "The mine's production is expected to move higher through the remainder of this year, particularly in the fourth quarter, as higher grade ore is mined," Loughrey says.
Thompson Creek mine in Idaho is on track for full-year output of between 16.5 million and 17 million lbs, while its Endako mine in British Columbia is on target to produce between 6.5 million and 7.5 million lbs. However, there is a lag of up to 2.5 months between the time a pound of molybdenum is mined to when it is processed, smelted and sold.
Meanwhile, Eduardo Titelman, executive vice president of Cochilco, the Chile state copper commission, believes molybdenum prices will average $33/lb for all of 2008. The year-to-date average is $33, up from $30 in 2007 and less than $25 in 2006. Titelman cites a supply tightness caused by a 22% decline in first-half Chilean production. Chile is the world's third-largest molybdenum producer after the U.S. and China.
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