Caledon Resources Share Discussion Threads

[spights] 16/3/2011 08:56

Hi ps0u3165 - its breaking news on Sky.Maybe they are behind with the news

[ps0u3165] 16/3/2011 08:00

Spights-4435, Workers were ordered to withdraw briefly from the power plant on Wednesday after radiation levels surged. Lasted an hour they are now back in there.

[spights] 16/3/2011 07:06

Breaking News6:52am UK, Wednesday March 16, 2011
Staff Evacuated From Japanese Nuclear Plant
Not a good morning.

[spights] 16/3/2011 06:33

1.58 AUD = 0.976569 GBP

[spights] 15/3/2011 16:04

Leading the commodity charge is interest in coal, iron ore, coal and silver. Rumours that BHP Billiton and Teck Resources have settled prime hard coking coal contracts for the April/June 2011 quarter at a record price of US$325 per tonne

[spights] 15/3/2011 16:02

Many of the mines are still not producing in Aus.

[marben100] 15/3/2011 14:56

Ho hum, added some Caledon below 98p in today's generalised market panic. Whilst I remain confident that GRAM's bid will materialise, even if it didn't, Caledon's future looks bright to me.

Though there may be some short-term hit to coking coal demand, due to closure of Japanese steelworks, MORE steel will be needed to repair infrastructure as Japan rebuilds. Prices are already around $300/tonne. At anything over $250/tonne, Caledon will be coining it, even without the long promised productivity increases. See

"New Delhi, Mar 15: State run SAIL today said prices of vital steel-making raw materials like coking coal and iron ore are expected to soften in the short term due to the devastation caused by the tsunami in Japan.

"The demand of coking coal will be about 10 million tonnes less monthly (due to impact of tsunami on Japan). So there will be some impact on prices. It has to be contained and should come down," Steel Authority of India (SAIL) Chairman, Mr C S Verma said here on the sidelines of a steel conference.

"There must be some impact on iron ore prices as production from Japanese steel companies are expected to come down in next 1-2 months," he added.

Mr Verma, however, refused to give any projection on how much raw material prices may decline in near term. "In any case, the coking coal prices at current levels of $300 plus are not sustainable," he said.

The SAIL chairman also said that Indian steel companies will be ready to export if Japan imports steel as part of its rebuilding exercise.

"They are yet to make a proper assessment of the losses. Let them recover and then these things can be discussed," Mr Verma added."

Regards,

Mark

[spights] 15/3/2011 11:48

News
March 14, 2011

Expect The Unexpected In Commodities And Elsewhere, In The Wake Of The Disaster In Japan
By Rob Davies



Living with a lot of debt, or taking other kinds of financial risks, is fine - if things stay as they are. It is when unexpected events happen that people, companies and institutions suddenly discover things about themselves they never knew before. It was the Kobe earthquake in 1995 that provoked a sharp move in the Nikkei index, which in turn triggered massive margin requirements for Barings on positions it didn't know it had. Barings went bust shortly after. A few years later, the Russian debt crisis in 1998 sucked liquidity from the market and prevented LTCM from unwinding its positions. It had to be rescued by Greenspan and Wall Street. And a rise in the gold price precipitated the demise of over borrowed Ashanti when it couldn't meet the margin requirements on its forward gold sales.
These companies, and many more with similar stories, were only too happy surviving on the status quo. It was when something changed that they realised they hadn't prepared for every eventuality. Last Friday's horrific earthquake and subsequent tsunami in Japan will undoubtedly have a severe impact. It is also likely to have dramatic and unforeseen consequences on other entities as well, bit we probably won't discover who or what these are for a while yet.

The situation is still very confused but it is clear that Japan's nuclear generating capacity has been severely impacted. The government has estimated that 20 million KWh of capacity was lost in the immediate aftermath of the earthquake. That is about 40 per cent of the total. Domestic and industrial demand will obviously be reduced as well, but is likely to recover well before the nuclear plants are recommissioned.

Indeed, there may now be a fundamental rethink about the suitability of building such plants in coastal areas that are vulnerable to tsunamis. In any event, demand for fossil fuels in Japan for power stations and temporary generators will surely rise as a result of the disaster. This pressure on an already tight market could have a dramatic effect on the price of oil and coal.

It is hard to envisage the Japanese stock markets doing anything other than falling significantly as the full extent of the damage becomes known, and as they factor in the likely the loss of wealth and earnings power. A bigger concern, though, is the potential reaction of the Japanese bond market. According to Société Générale, Japan's tax revenue last year did not even cover its government's non-discretionary spending: items like social security, education and debt servicing. Even more worrying is that the ratio of public debt to revenue for Japan already stands at 16. Japan is a very rich country but it is also highly indebted and only just paying its way. This disaster might tip it over the edge.

Investors reacted to the news on Friday by selling off base metals, compounding a move away from risk assets that had already got underway over the last week. The LME Index fell by 6.3 per cent to 4,155.6, although copper delivered an even worse performance, dropping by seven per cent to US$9,193 a tonne. Nickel, in keeping with its volatile nature, dropped by 10 per cent to US$25,970.

In the short term the move to risk averse assets is likely to lead to further falls. However, if there is a full scale financial crisis in Japanese financial markets, and a loss of confidence in the yen and Japanese government bonds, the definition of a risk-free asset may no longer include the bonds issued by the world's third largest economy. And if the yen is not safe many people might start looking at commodities in a different, rosier, light

[spights] 15/3/2011 11:41

News
March 08, 2011

Miners Appear To Be In A State Of Euphoria At This Year's PDAC In Canada
By Our Canadian Correspondent



With most commodities at or near all-time highs it is little wonder that the attendees at the Prospectors and Developers Association of Canada Conference in Toronto this week are in a visible state of profound happiness. Whether it is coal, copper, gold or zinc, the largest mining conference in the world is once again offering up a smorgasbord of commodity ideas for potential investors.
A new attendance record is expected for the 2011 conference, surpassing last year's 22,000 delegates. The Investor Exchange floor is a mad house of bodies looking for the next hot deal. The analysts started the conference off in fine form by making a strong case that commodity prices will remain strong for the foreseeable future.

Leading the commodity charge is interest in coal, iron ore, coal and silver. Rumours that BHP Billiton and Teck Resources have settled prime hard coking coal contracts for the April/June 2011 quarter at a record price of US$325 per tonne sparked interest in Canadian metallurgical coal producers, while a potential new initial public offering called Black Iron kept the iron ore watchers on their toes. The money that Black Iron raises is reportedly set to fund the Shymanivske iron deposit in the Ukraine. More and more speculators are also jumping on the silver band wagon, and Eric Sprott is now predicting north of US$50 per ounce for the poor man's gold.

Potential mergers and acquisitions are also at the forefront. According to PwC's Mining Deals report, the first month-and-a-half of 2011 were witness to a record US$27 billion worth of deals announced, with 81 per cent occurring in the gold, iron ore, coal, copper and fertilizer space. Looking ahead to the rest of 2011, PwC believes that predators will target junior rare earth and uranium projects. Justifying this belief is talk from the exhibitor floor, where the word seems to be that major producers are making so much cash that more mergers are a certainty. The only things that could derail the mining merger and acquisition train are political unrest and macroeconomic instability - both of which seem to be increasing by the day.

This fact was voiced by a few well-heeled pundits with the wider markets in mind. The major concerns revolve around higher interest rates and a bigger political blow-up in the Middle East. The political situation in Libya already has the price of crude north of US$106 per barrel, and if investors really get spooked and start cashing out their stock market chips, look out below!

The interest rate scenario appears to be more controversial. The general view is that a rise in real interest rates will have a negative impact on commodities prices, particularly for precious metals. While it is unlikely that the United States or Japan will raise interest rates in the short term, because of their fragile economies, countries like China and India have been raising rates to combat inflation, and European Central Bank President Trichet signaled that the ECB may also consider raising interest rates as soon as April. Once the major economies of the world uniformly raise rates, the opportunity cost to hold gold may be too high, and result in a flow of funds out of the gold space. Most analysts seem to believe that this is still many years out, as currency turmoil is all but a certainty. Portugal was named as being the most likely country to fall into the next sovereign debt crisis, and some think contagion could spread to the United States and Japan. This worry should keep gold prices strong throughout 2011.

At the core shack Kaminak Gold's Coffee property and Atac Resources' Rackla projects in the Yukon are catching more than a few eyes, as are the rocks from Batero Gold's Batero-Quinchia project in Colombia.

All was not rosy for the Colombian stories however, as Greystar Resources sparked the annual political risk-environmental challenges debate after announcing the early termination of the environmental public hearing with respect to its Angostura project in Colombia. This hearing was part of the ongoing application process for securing the environmental permit, but confrontations stopped the hearings.

On the awards front, prospector Shawn Ryan gets to pick up the Prospector of the Year Award for his discoveries of the Underworld Resources and Kaminak Gold properties. Underworld Resources and its White Gold deposit were taken over by Kinross Gold in a US$138 million deal, while Kaminak continues to be a market favorite for 2011. The Viola R. MacMillan Award for mine development will be awarded to gold growth story Agnico-Eagle Mines.

Typical for any bull market, the number of silk suits with no geological back ground "talking the talk" but clearly unable to "walk the walk" is of concern. So is the lack of qualified people in the industry able to meet up with the growing amount of money coming into the exploration sector. Throw in the fact that valuations in the junior exploration side can only be described as over-extended and one gets the feeling that at some point, investors will get burnt badly. The general feeling amongst industry experts is that "while a rising tide lifts all boats", selecting quality juniors with real assets is the only recipe for success in the longer term. In other words, if you gorge on the smorgasbord, you might well end up with a bad case of investor indigestion.

That's it for the first two days of the PDAC. Later in the week, we will update the highs and the lows from the Exhibitor Exhibition in an effort to separate the wheat from the chaff.

[spights] 15/3/2011 06:48

The news from Japan is dreadful.My thoughts and prays are with them.

[spights] 15/3/2011 06:36

1.58 AUD = 0.977796 GBP
Good Morning all.

[spights] 14/3/2011 11:00

Hi Phillis no:o(

[spights] 14/3/2011 06:11

1.615 AUD = 1.01355 GBP
Good Morning all...
Japanese markets down almost 5%
There were no trades on ASX for CDN

[whyme] 13/3/2011 17:13

spights : Good post
The Japanese (for which I have relations in the country and my thoughts are with them all) may need to keep equities high and invest where possible but they will need a way to fund the investments. POL and CDN are in an ideal position as the commodities could be in high demand (Coal, Iron etc).

But I think out of all the countries they can get through this it and may pull them out of the problems they were in but it may take over the next 10 years.

Will they be investing in commodities to part negate any price increases ?
Apart from the food, medical, minerals and materials, water etc, think of the numbers of PC's (Copper), Screens, phones, and anything else.

Any views on Bonds comments welcome

[dr knowledge] 11/3/2011 22:23

Hope you are not refering to today's tragedy in Japan!

[whyme] 11/3/2011 08:42

They will need materials in the area to build and produce - should be a winner for POL and CDN

[afrim] 11/3/2011 08:36

Mornin Spights, still no news :-((...
A

[spights] 11/3/2011 06:42

1.615 AUD = 1.00595 GBP
Good Morning all.

[grannyboy] 10/3/2011 09:00

Wonder how long they'r going to give the Chinese to sort out their red tape? as since the completion date as already been extended!!!!!!!!.

[spights] 10/3/2011 06:43

1.635 AUD = 1.01688 GBP
Good Morning all
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[spights] 09/3/2011 06:28

1.595 AUD = 0.994978 GBP
Good Morning all and Afrim.

[afrim] 08/3/2011 17:26

Perhaps tomorrow Spights, I hope!...
A