The discovery of a massive new coal reserve in Xinjiang Uygur is hoped will help meet China's coal requirements, which are set to grow to 1 gigaton during the 12th 5-year plan.
The positive fundamentals behind gold's continued strong performance are expected to remain in place in 2012, which will allow it to continue its role as a safe haven
The 2012 edition of Mineweb's gold price prediction competition is here; in 2011, Mineweb readers' average predictions have been comfortably more accurate than those of ‘experts' in a similar LBMA exercise.
Betting that copper prices would rise, Barclays Capital traders lost tens of millions of dollars, sources say, the bank said the losses were not "big" and that there was no "abnormal" trade.
The substantial capex required for the development of a rare earths mine, compounded by major miners' lack of interest in mining rare earths, may spell trouble in meeting future demand.
The Japanese tsunami and subsequent Fukishima nuclear accident in March challenged uranium market sentiment. A retrospective of expert commentary on this still-promising sector from the Energy Report.