Tungsten market after falling on November, in November and December the price starts to go up stability. The reason that tungsten series products’ price going up is because tungsten price falling down to production cost line so many mines and factories stop to operate and produce. So now spot market has a problems of energy pinch. Besides, some tungsten corporations got union to make tungsten price going up. So the price of tungsten series product are going up. At the same time, because many mines stop operating so tungsten concentrate price going up result in APT manufacturers, ferro tungsten manufacturers and other manufactures hard to buy the raw materials so lead to tungsten series products’ price going up. On the other hand, China State Reserve Bureau has some purchase plan about tungsten and it play a significant role at shore up tungsten series products’ price.

 

According to the early report, Ganzhou Tungsten Instruction Association after 2 months stop putting up the guide price,at the early of December it put up a new guide price of tungsten price. The guide price compare to maker tungsten price is lower. But due to the reasons which analyzed at the before so tungsten series produces’ price is relatively strong and continue to going up. There are some tungsten product’s guide price which given by Ganzhou Tungsten Instruction Association at the early of December, wolframite concentrate: 62,000 RMB/ton; APT:100,000 RMB/ton, medium grain tungsten powder: 160 RMB/kg.

 

Tungsten series products market prospect: at present the whole tungsten market is going better and the confident of this industry has improved. However, due to China steel production is saturated and the times of cutting production is coming, so steel industry still depress. Steel industry depress will occurs bad effect at tungsten bar, tungsten rod and other tungsten products. At the same time, there are still have some limiting condition of tungsten products on the market so the up range of tungsten price will not very large. Tungsten market price although going up, but many manufacturers still hold see and wait opinion so the turnover of tungsten will not too much.  

 

The price of devolution

 

In the lead up to devolution, concerns were raised that the resource revenues promised in the deal with Canada would not be enough to outweigh the high costs of taking on additional responsibility.

 

So far, the deal has indeed under-delivered, at least in terms of revenues. Despite originally estimating that it could collect a share totalling $60 million for the year, the GNWT lowered its estimate for the 2014-15 fiscal year to closer to $40 million. Based on the continued downturn in mining, oil and gas in the territory, it’s likely that 2015-16 will see similar figures.

 

To add to that, we still don’t have a clear enough picture of the total costs of devolution to fully understand if the benefits of northern control are truly outweighing the liabilities.

 

While the GNWT is probably not planning any further acquisitions of resource properties in the near future, the move to save Mactung raises red flags, not only about the dire state of global resource markets, but the lengths the government is willing to go to try to salvage the industry for the sake of resource revenues.

 

We may still be in the throes of the post-devolution evolution, but it seems rather doubtful that acquiring a mining property was what territorial leaders — and residents — had in mind when they said they wanted more control over lands, water and resources in the NWT. By throwing this property a taxpayer-funded lifeline, the GNWT has set a dangerous precedent for a struggling sector and revealed its own economic panic.

Extra securities not received

 

Prior to Cantung’s closure, concerns were raised by regular members of the legislative assembly about the danger of leaving taxpayers on the hook for the mine. Recently retired Weledeh MLA Bob Bromley questioned whether the securities would be enough to clean up the property if it went under, a fear sprung from the bungling of Yellowknife’s defunct Giant Mine.

 

As with Giant, the federal government is now responsible for Cantung’s remediation. While the tungsten operation promises to leave a much less permanent and hazardous mark on the landscape than Giant’s 237,000 tonnes of arsenic trioxide, environmental groups have already raised concerns about the need for independent oversight.

 

Along with the mine, Canada was also handed the security bonds collected from NATCL. As of last spring, the amount in pocket was just over $11 million. In June, the regulator requested the company pony up an additional $19 million in securities for the mine, bringing the total to $30.95 million.

 

But according to the GNWT, that extra security deposit was never received, and there is no other word on whether or not it will — or can — still be collected from the bankrupt company.

Tungsten price climb will be slow: analysts

 

Critics in the Dehcho had long grumbled about NATCL’s properties, which despite geographically resting — at least somewhat, in the case of Mactung — in the Northwest Territories, really only contributed economically to the Yukon in terms of jobs, while leaving the NWT with all the risk.

 

For Cantung, that risk now lies with Canada. While NATCL has indicated it hopes to resume operations at the mine (which closed on Oct. 27 following 80 layoffs in the spring) by next summer, that’s going to depend on financing.

 

Tungsten prices are currently bottoming out at around $180 per MT, down significantly from their 2010 climb to around $450. Although current forecasts peg the price of tungsten as poised to rise over the next few years, the recovery from this 10-year low is likely to be slow.

 

“I think we will see the price begin to rise slowly as economic demand recovers, but it is going to be nothing dramatic,” analyst Chris Ecclestone of Hallgarten & Company said in a recent interview with Tungsten Investing News.

 

“If financing improves for the mining sector, it’s not going to be a case of everyone in the mining sector suddenly being able to get money. It will probably be gold projects and big base metals projects getting funding before specialty metals.”

 

An optimistic view places the price of tungsten closer to $200 by the end of the year and possibly $300 by the end of 2016, but the light at the end of the tunnel is conditional upon a lot of what-ifs, most notably what China — tungsten’s biggest exporter — decides to do about regulating its production.

 

So what if the price never rebounds?

During the work program conducted in August 2015, 490 soil samples were collected throughout the property. The samples were collected by means of hand-held augers. Sampling was conducted along east-west traverses and locally adjacent to the main paved road which transects the property from north to south. The soil samples were submitted to ALS Minerals for tungsten analysis by Lithium Metaborate Fusion and Inductively Coupled Plasma – Mass Spectrometry (ICP-MS). Soil samples from multiple regions of the property returned greater than 100 parts per million (ppm) tungsten, including a sample from the southern region of the property which returned 1380 ppm tungsten.

 

The program identified local tungsten soil anomalies in the northern half of the property. Tungsten mineralization was documented in this northern region as per publically available reports filed during the 1980s by Kidd Creek Mines Ltd. (assessment reports filed with the Newfoundland and Labrador Department of Natural Resources). Tungsten mineralization was confirmed in rubble and bedrock at two close-spaced quarries in this region during the August 2015 rock sampling program which was completed concurrently with the soil sampling program. Multiple grab samples of quarry rubble assayed greater than 5% WO3 (Great Atlantic Resources News Release of November 19, 2015). The soil sampling program confirmed tungsten soil anomalies (up to 116 ppm W) in the general area of these two quarries, interpreted by company management to be associated with the tungsten mineralization at the quarries. The program confirmed tungsten soil anomalies in three areas northwest, north and northeast of these quarries with up to 402 ppm W. Company management interpret these particular soil anomalies to possibly represent separate sources of tungsten mineralization as they are not in the documented down-ice glacial direction from the two quarries.

 

Dave Martin, vice president of exploration at Great Atlantic, commented:

 

The 2015 soil sampling identified tungsten anomalies in the area of known tungsten mineralization at the two northern quarries confirming that soil sampling is a useful exploration tool in this area. The program was successful in confirming tungsten anomalies elsewhere on the property, establishing targets for further work in addition to the two northern quarries.

Tailings Reprocessing

 

On another score the company has been considering the issue of tailings recovery as specific areas where tailings have been deposited still contain economic WO3 grades. The amount in the dumps is a not insubstantial amount at half the level of the current reserve in the ground.

 

Almonty tested reprocessing the tailings stockpile by blending tailings with fresh ore during Q1 2014. Bulk testing of 100% tailings ore was run through the plant at Los Santos without any additional modifications. Recovery rates achieve exceeded expectations and management believes that target recovery rates for tailings reprocessing will be achieved when the tailings stockpiles are eventually reprocessed.

Mining

 

The open pit operations are conventional drill and blast operations. The aerial view below shows the main pit with the green structure to the left being the processing plant and the Los Santos South (Main) pit being the bright white patch just right of centre. Towards the town at the top of the photo is a smaller Las Cortinas pit that has been developed over the last few years.

 

The production mining & drilling operations currently employ 65 people and this task is undertaken by a contractor. All of the other 68 employees on site work directly for Daytal (Almonty’s Spanish subsidiary).

 

For the moment plans for going underground have been discounted (while the price for APT remains where it is). In some ways the need for that strategy has been reduced by making the pits deeper and via the mini “super-pit” implementation.

 

This added production will come at no increase in staff costs.