TORONTO, June 9 (Reuters) - HudBay Minerals (HBM.TO) could restart its Chisel North zinc mine in Manitoba if the metal's price increase another 10 or 15 percent from its current level, the company's chief executive said on Tuesday.
HudBay shut Chisel North and its Balmat zinc mine in New York last year after zinc prices fell below 50 cents a pound late last year, after topping $2 a pound in 2006.
Cash zinc MZN0 was around 71 cents a pound on Tuesday.
"We think a 10 to 15 percent increase from that price and we will be looking seriously of reopening Chisel, which can be done very quickly indeed," Jones said at a mining conference in Toronto.
That suggests a zinc price of 78 cents to 82 cents a pound would be needed to consider reopening the mine.
Hudbay was prudent enough to have accumulated large war chest of net cash (equal to about a third of its market cap at the time) by the time commodity prices collapsed last year, so it has been able to weather the downturn.
The (modest, so far) rebound in zinc prices this year may be another data point in support of James Kynge's "China Continental" thesis.
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2 comments:
Ironically, the more Zinc mines that reopen the less likely a significant rise in Zince pricing will occur.
The folks at Hudbay, I think, are aware of this supply-demand dynamic, which is part of the reason they closed the mine in the first place. I suspect that it might be profitable for them to reopen the mine now, but they are waiting for zinc prices to appreciate more first so they have something of a margin of safety.
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